


Break Down to Build Up

by TheHeartsCompass



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Buckle up, Emotional Roller Coaster, F/M, First Sad Feels, Hurt/Comfort, It's Gonna Give You the Feels, Romance, Then Happy Feels, alternate storyline
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-27
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-05-23 11:45:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 40,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6115455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHeartsCompass/pseuds/TheHeartsCompass
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seven years have passed since the unexplained, surprise disappearance of Ladybug. Adrien, left riddled with guilt and heartache, has struggled with moving forward. Now, the time has finally come to walk the road to recovery, and His Lady matches every step at his side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Death of a Hero

Chapter 1: Death of a Hero

"I think it's time."

The words were nearly drowned away by the cacophonous city sounds below. A fearful twitch of Plagg's ear, however, proved the kwami did indeed hear Adrien's pained musings. The tiny creature's head twisted halfway in the hero's direction, incapable of fully facing him. Plagg's gut clenched forebodingly, a nauseous sensation overwhelming him.

"You're not talking about—"

"I am." Adrien abruptly answered before Plagg could finish voicing his question.

A stillness settled over the room, as though the pair had been frozen by the chilling air which seeped through the open balcony doors. Eventually, Adrien let out a heavy sigh and turned his back to Plagg in favor of leaning over the balcony banister, giving his attention to the rooftops of Paris. This had become one of his favorite pastimes over the lonely years: looking out over his city, leaving his doors open to its noise, letting it fill the emptiness of his penthouse and his mind. It helped him think.

"I've been thinking a lot lately," Adrien announced to the night sky.

"That's never a good thing." Plagg's teasing remark was too forced to achieve a sense of his and Adrien's partnership during the good old days.

The kwami knew it was only a matter of time—the kid had been down spiraling for years—but knowing didn't make it any easier now that the time had come.

The tease did manage a slight pull at the edge of the man's lips. A fleeting moment, of course, for as Adrien looked down at his woven hands, his face pinched in concentration. Pensively, he removed the ring donning his finger. The loss of the metal's cool kiss was met with initial shock, but was quickly soothed away by a calming breeze passing over the exposed skin the ring once hid.

The young man's green eyes followed the moving dots below his perch. "You know," Adrien murmured, "There's some teen out there that would make a perfect Chat Noir."

Plagg winced at his words, how easily they rolled off his tongue, how easily he painted a picture of him being replaced.

"He'd be thrilled beyond belief, I bet." Adrien grinned to himself, imagining. "Power, fame, girls. Isn't that what every teenage guy dreams of?"

"Except you?"

Adrien's face soured. "I did once, too. It doesn't suit me as well as it used to, I suppose."

Plagg curled into himself, tugging at his whiskers in an attempt to get a hold of himself. He couldn't let the kid walk out on him. He just couldn't.

"Well, I don't need some teenager. I have you," Plagg snapped, his voice at risk of cracking.

Adrien's resolution almost wavered at the emotion that had escaped his kwami companion. Nevertheless, the man walked over to crouch in front of his friend, and his mouth opened without hesitation to respond. "This is right, you know that. It's for the best."

Opening and closing, Plagg's mouth found no words. That was the worst part of all, Plagg realized: Adrien was all too right. With the state of mind Adrien was in, it would only hurt them both to keep putting him through this. He couldn't make him stay.

Plagg looked up at Adrien, the human's face warped by the moisture welling up in the kwami's eyes. Adrien appeared to be in a similar state.

"I need to do this. For me." Adrien offered a sad smile. "It's selfish, I know," he followed with an eyeroll, "But I need to be selfish for once."

Setting his jaw stubbornly, Plagg crossed his tiny arms and pinned Adrien with a fierce glare. "I'm not taking a new partner," the kwami declared.

Adrien choked on a chuckle. "What? You're going to wait around for me to get better?"

"If that's what it takes," Plagg remained firm despite knowing fully well how childish he sounded trying to get his way.

The blonde smiled a smile that didn't reach his eyes. Genuine smiles no longer seemed possible. "You say that like you think I'll actually get better."

"You will." It seemed to be equally a command and a promise.

Giving a breathy laugh, Adrien looked at his friend, shaking his head in amazement. Glancing down, the hero felt the weight of his signature ring in his hand. Lifting his gaze to lock onto Plagg, the young man presented the kwami with the ring, ready to hand over his second identity.

"I guess this isn't goodbye then, is it?" Adrien offered.

Taking the ring was one of the hardest things Plagg had ever done. "You couldn't get rid of me that easily," the kwami whipped back with conviction, feigning strength.

There was a wordless exchange between the two as they searched the other's eyes. Adrien finally straightened and stood tall as though the weight on his shoulders had become marginally lighter.

"Thanks," Adrien said sincerely. "Thanks for everything." His thanks were unnecessary, they went unsaid, but Adrien felt he needed to say them nonetheless.

"Anytime," Plagg replied automatically.

With a final look, Adrien let out a relieved sigh and blinked several times to clear his vision before he crossed the room to leave. The click of the door closing echoed out to the open balcony, allowing all of Paris to hear the sound of Chat Noir's resignation.

* * *

There was a time when all Plagg cared about was cheese. It had been a blissfully simple time.

Plagg had come to learn that caring about anything more than cheese was painfully complex. Emphasis on painful.

Watching Adrien slowly deteriorate caused him unbearable misery. Knowing there was nothing he could do only made Plagg feel worse. How could he have helped Adrien save countless lives as Chat Noir, but when it came down to it, the kwami couldn't even help his partner?

Staying by Adrien's side, Plagg determined, was the best support he could offer. He sadly soon realized his company was a double edged sword, for he also served as a bitter reminder:

Even at the age of twenty-four, Adrien was still consumed by the events of seven years ago—the unexpected disappearance and likely death of Ladybug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Sad start, I know, but that's what the title promised! Prepare your feels for an emotional roller coaster, my friend, 'cause I'm about to take you on a ride. Buckle up!
> 
> Also, to anyone wondering how I moved from the "KILL ALL THE TITANS!" fandom to the "Bye, bye, pretty butterfly!" fandom... I have no explanation. I'm trying some new stuff. Anyway, hope you enjoy!
> 
> ~THC~


	2. Casting Blame

Chapter 2: Casting Blame

 

He was too desperate. He acted without thinking. That’s how he got Ladybug killed.

No, not killed. Adrien refused to believe what everyone else had come to terms with. They didn’t know Ladybug like he did. Adrien had seen Ladybug overcome so much, far too much for her to be offed by him having such a simple screw-up.

December twentieth—the first day of snow and the last day Adrien saw Ladybug.

* * *

 

Chat Noir always liked to keep the impression of being unshakable. Heroes were supposed to be fearless in the face of danger he thought. But no matter how hard he tried, Chat could never remain unaffected by civilian deaths.

“Chat!”

An akumatized construction worker. He’d been running rampant for hours, flooding the streets with waves of cement that he could harden and liquefy at will. Chat had arrived too late on the scene. Several people had been swept up in the sea of cement, and it had been quickly hardened, leaving the civilians’ heads submerged and only frantic arms stretching out of the deathtrap. He’d immediately activated Cataclysm to destroy the blocks holding them hostage, but three people had already suffocated.

A man, a woman, and a child.

Ladybug had to drag him away from the aftermath. He hadn’t been able to move on his own. She brought him into an empty restaurant bathroom to revert back to his real form and wait for Plagg to refuel. His Lady had remained on the other side of the door, attempting to talk him through everything he was feeling.

One of his regrets was that he hadn’t heard what she said. His ears were still ringing, his hands numb to Plagg’s prodding for his attention, shock having a vicious hold on him as he stood motionlessly with his back pressed against the door for support.

Adrien spent countless nights imagining what Ladybug had said.

Comforting. Kind. Warm. That’s how he imagined her words. She’d always been so caring. Towards him. Towards everyone. At that moment, he felt like the last person deserving of her compassion. Yet, she gave it to him anyway.

“ _ Chat! _ ”

He did remember her yelling after him. Once he transformed back to the masked Chat Noir, he fled out a broken bathroom window. Tiny flurries of snowflakes, the first of the season, had begun to dance in the breeze. Chat tore through them in pursuit of their target.

Time was of the essence. There was only so much that Ladybug’s Lucky Charm could fix. Its energy wasn’t limitless. He needed to put an end to this  _ now _ . The more time wasted, the more damage there would be and less of a chance that absolutely everything would go back to how it’d been before.

Everything  _ had _ to go back to normal.

“ _ Chat! _ Wait!”

She must have hauled ass to catch up with him. Chat had stopped on the chimney of a rooftop, knowing his target was close. The akumatized villain was likely waiting for the prime moment to strike down the heroes.

Adrien remembered the feeling of her hand gripping his wrist, keeping him from running off again. There was a slight tremble in her hold. She was just as shaken as he was. In hindsight, he realized that him acting so recklessly was probably part of the reason his Lady was afraid. She was worried about him.

“Calm down, okay?” She pleaded with him, her blue eyes— _ God, _ they were so blue—swirling with concern. “We can do this,  _ together _ , just like every other time!”

She looked so sure.

“Everything will be fine,” Ladybug promised him.

That was the only promise Ladybug had ever broken.

His superior hearing picked up the whistle of the projectile amid the chorus of whispering snowflakes. That was the only warning.

His head whipped around just in time to see the brick hurtling his way. And then he made the greatest mistake of his life. Instead of batting the object to the side with his staff, he dodged.

It was thoughtless. His mind wasn’t all there. He just reacted.

His last second reaction caused the brick to shoot past him and clip the side of Ladybug’s head.

He’d been standing right in front of her, after all. He blocked her view. She hadn’t seen it coming until it was far too late. Her hand slipped from his wrist as though in slow-motion. Chat couldn’t process it fast enough to catch her hand, and he watched her tumble over the roof’s edge.

He threw himself full-force over the edge not a moment later. Landing first, he caught his partner the second before she hit the pavement. Her head jerked violently at the abrupt stop. There was no tension in her body as Chat shook her in his arms.

Adrien didn’t know how many times he chanted her name, trying to call her back to the world of consciousness. Ladybug’s eyelids eventually fluttered open. Her eyes wandered over his face—almost as though lost and trying to find something familiar—as he blabbered nonsensical words of relief.

A distant crash broke the spell. Chat Noir hurriedly shot a look over his shoulder. He rapidly moved Ladybug to prop her against a pile of garbage bags against the alley wall. Quickly explaining that he’d beat the man responsible and return soon, Chat searched Ladybug’s face for confirmation.

She watched his fast-moving lips, entirely unfocused. Chat misinterpreted the bobbing of her head as a nod. Chat Noir ran from the alleyway, more desperate than ever. 

He missed Ladybug’s head lolling backwards, her mouth beginning to gasp for air like a fish, and a tiny stream of blood matching her disguise peaking out from her hairline.

He returned an hour hour later, akuma trapped within his hands, to find the alleyway completely empty.

* * *

 

Adrien kept the akuma in a small jar for a year. He held onto it for Ladybug to someday de-evilize.

Plagg had infused some of his energy into the glass to keep the creature from escaping. The kwami had done it without question or bribing, knowing how much it mattered to the blonde boy.

_ “Officials now declare it is a safe bet to assume that Paris’s beloved hero, Ladybug, is dead.” _

The remote creaked a weak protest as Adrien’s grip threatened to break it.

“Turn it off,” Plagg warned from behind Adrien. The teen was deaf to his words.

_ “The blame falls to Chat Noir, obviously,” _ a snide voice from the television screen cut into Adrien. He recognized him. Some hero from Marseille. Beside the tall, suited man stood a slight female hero who Adrien assumed was his partner.  _ “Partners always have each other’s back. If something happens to the other, it’s clearly their fault.”  _ The man looked to the woman at his side, a strong sense of allegiance communicated between the two, and she nodded in agreement.

The image was soon marred by a web of jagged, hairline cracks created by a remote being chucked at the pair of heroes.

Adrien killed the akuma that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Let me know if you liked it! Thanks for reading!


	3. Cut Loose

Chapter 3: Cut Loose

 

“I’m quitting.”

Adrien stood tall as he spoke, his face stoic despite the instinctive wave of nausea that overtook him by standing up to his father. The twenty-four year old had to mentally remind himself to stop acting like some quivering, cowardly teenager afraid of Daddy’s disapproval. He was his own man now. Or, he was about to be.

Gabriel Agreste looked up from his paperwork and removed his ear piece. He turned his steely gaze on Adrien, giving him a blank look as though he hadn’t been listening.

“What?”

“You heard me,” Adrien replied tersely, refusing to repeat himself. Today, he would be the one to command his father’s attention—not the other way around.

An eyebrow quirked at his son’s boldness, Gabriel peered over the rims of his glasses at the blonde before returning to writing the details of a business deal. “Quitting what?” the man asked as his pen scratched paper. “Your fencing lessons? Don’t waste my time, be specific.”

Adrien’s eye twitched.  _ That _ was why he was doing this. He had dropped fencing years ago. Apparently, his father didn’t care enough to pay attention. Adrien wasn’t going to put himself through this anymore.

“I’m quitting working for you.”

The pen skidded to a stop, an unsightly blotch of ink developing where it rested. “Oh, really?” Gabriel questioned. “That’s ridiculous,” he dismissed his son’s statement, “Is this about you wanting a larger cut? The dramatics are unnecessary.”

“No, I’m here to—”

“Listen, I said don’t waste my time. I can’t be bothered with—”

_ “ No _ ,” Adrien forcibly cut his father off. _“_ _ You _ listen. To  _ me _ .”

The order was louder than he anticipated. His breath came out in tiny pants, a sign of the marathon his heart was currently sprinting. Before Gabriel could react, Adrien let loose.

“I want to be  _ happy, _ ” Adrien exclaimed. “I want to do what I want, and I don’t even know what that is anymore! I always went along with whatever plans you had for me. You, y-you molded me into whatever you wanted, never giving a damn about how I felt. And maybe I never said anything because I didn’t give a damn either. But, that aside, I... I’m...” Tearing a hand through his purposeful, put-together hair, Adrien ignored the small stutters and continued, gaining momentum. “I’m leaving this company, and I’m starting over. I’m going to try everything on my own. My own decisions, my own challenges, my own mistakes.  _ Hell!  _ I might not stick with a modeling career! I don’t know if I even  _ like  _ it anymore! I’ll become a hot dog vendor in a heartbeat if that makes me happy!”

Adrien looked earnestly into his dad’s eyes, hoping some part of this was getting through to him. “I need to figure my life out,” he finished breathlessly.

Dead air hung between the two as Adrien waited for Gabriel’s reaction. This was the first time Adrien had ever had a personal conversation with his father, and he had no idea what to expect. Adrien supposed maybe his dad was the same way.

With a soft thud, Gabriel placed the pen on the desk to rest. Taking off his glasses and folding his hands together, the older man gave Adrien his undivided attention.

“You can’t figure it out or be happy around me?” Adrien was caught off guard. Was that concern?

“I need to cut out the people negatively affecting my life before I can start fixing it. So, yes.” He answered honestly though he knew the truth was a harsh slap across the face. Gabriel winced from behind his pristine desk, his stoney shoulder having been dealt a chip.

There was a stretch of silence before his father spoke again. “You’re going to end up right back here when you go broke,” the man said stiffly. His gaze wasn’t as steady as before, straying unsurely to look at things that weren’t his son’s fiery eyes; Gabriel’s eyes might have been desperately searching for some convincing argument to make Adrien stay.

“Not everything is about money!” Adrien exasperatedly cried out. “I have my own money! Not a lot of it, but that’s perfectly fine! That’s all I need right now!”

It was true. Adrien had put aside his own money from modeling for the day he would have the courage to take this great leap. His account was a glass of water compared compared to the ocean that was his father’s. But that shouldn’t matter. Money shouldn’t matter that much, Adrien had decided.

“And even if I do end up back here, then at least I left. The separation should be good for me,” Adrien said with conviction.

Gabriel finally met Adrien’s eyes. They held a new sense of confidence that the man had never seen in his son.

“Was it something that I did?” The question was a difficult one to ask. It left Gabriel vulnerable.

“N—” Adrien caught the word as it left his mouth. He wasn’t being honest with himself. “Partially. Not one stand-out thing. Smaller things that built up over time.”

Digesting the barbed admission was difficult. Gabriel swallowed several times, nodded slowly to himself, and returned his glasses to his face. The fragile barrier to his eyes was used in self preservation.

“I want the best for you.”

He was genuine.

“I know,” Adrien affirmed. It was something he’d told himself over and over: that he knew his dad loved him. Only now did he believe it.

“You’ve taken care of me as well as you know how,” Adrien continued and gave his dad a small, bittersweet smile. “But now it’s time for me to take care of myself.”

When Adrien left the office that day, despite his every step increasing the distance between them, he had never felt closer to his dad.

* * *

 

Adrien had come to a realization; all the happiness he’d ever had was given to him by someone else.

Plagg had found him, offered him a miraculous power, and changed his life overnight. The little kwami had bestowed him with Chat Noir, a personality that brought him freedom, purpose, and joy like he’d never experienced.

Gabriel Agreste gave him opportunities. Too many to count. While his father might have been distant, the man had always made sure his money was close at hand. Money might not buy happiness, but it sure was a convenient way to rent it. Money had found some of Adrien’s passions. Chinese, piano, fencing, and modeling—despite some no longer holding the same allure to his present-day self—were once key pieces of his identity.

And now here he was. Plagg, Chat Noir, and Gabriel Agreste were out of the picture. Somebody else wouldn’t simply hand him happiness this time around; he alone would be the one to find it.

He was stripping down to the bare basics: Adrien. Nothing more, nothing less.

A fresh start.

“Not the best place to start, but it fit your budget,” the woman droned, not bothering to act interested.

Adrien paid no mind to the third-rate landlady babbling on about the shoebox studio apartment. He chose to instead stare out the broken, plastic wrapped window onto the fire escape. Unlike his old balcony, it was only two stories off the ground. It didn’t have the best location either; the neighboring building was a club, so there was bound to be some disturbance of the peace. It would do, Adrien mused silently.

As he looked out onto the street below, a fluttering movement caught his eye. In the corner of the windowsill, a ladybug was fighting valiantly against the hold of a spiderweb. The corner of Adrien’s mouth curved upward at the sight, and he immediately came to her aid. With delicately swift fingers, he plucked the bug from the trap. He expected it to fly away once given its new freedom, but the red and black creature chose to instead tickle his hand as it scuttled from one fingertip to the next.

“Well, that’s about all there really is to see here. A sorry little dump of a place, isn’t it?” The landlady’s annoying, nasally voice disrupted the moment. “I’ve got a nice option a couple blocks from here that we can check out. Pricier, of course, but unlike this one nothing needs to be fixed or replaced—”

“I’ll take it.”

“Why, you haven’t even seen it yet!”

“No, this one. I’ll take this one.” Adrien smiled at the ladybug crawling around his palm. “I have a lucky feeling about it.”


	4. You Win Some, You Lose Some

Chapter 4: You Win Some, You Lose Some

 

Adrien liked to think that he broke both stereotypes of blondes and models being airheads. But, knowing his luck, Adrien should have predicted his intelligence bailing on him when he needed it most.

Any money Adrien made had previously been his father’s. That’s just how the modelling business world was set up. Clients contacted the company, the company contacts the model, the model models. Money flowed the same way, meaning everything Adrien earned was from the cut that Gabriel gave him.

The setup had seemed like no big deal until Adrien, having fitfully slept his first night in his new studio apartment on the rock hard floor, bolted awake in a cold sweat.

“I have no clients.” Each word produced a tiny puff of white air; Adrien hadn’t yet figured out the temperamental thermostat.

“They’re the company’s clients. Not mine. _I have no clients_.”

Adrien repeated the realization, dread steadily dripping into his bloodstream via some invisible IV. Two clammy hands covered his face as the implications dawned on him.

For the last month, Adrien had been taking a personal leave of absence. A luxury he was sure only the son of the head boss could acquire. Upon leaving, he’d turned over his work phone. The cell phone contained the numbers of every client he’d modeled for over the past four years.

All that contact information. Gone.

Adrien’s airhead moment included somehow deluding himself into thinking he’d be able to continue modeling when he no longer had anyone to model for.

The blonde turned over to bury his face in a pillow and then proceeded to scream obscenities over his own stupidity.

* * *

 

The morning brought rejection after rejection. Courteous, respectful rejection, but rejection nonetheless.

Adrien wrote down the name of every client he could remember off the top of his head, which he soon realized was a dismal amount. He went through the embarrassing process of researching their numbers, and being put endlessly on hold until he mentioned who he was.

His last name was once his greatest selling point. Now, however, it was his downfall.

“Adrien Agreste... Yes, as in Gabriel Agreste... No, I’m now representing myself independently.”

They all let him down easily, obviously not wanting to draw ill will from an Agreste. But he couldn’t blame them. Independent models were infamous for causing problems. A majority were money-grabbing, unreliable, drama-inducing, ticking timebombs. Most major clientele likely had a policy against hiring independent models.

And saying he’d become independent from Agreste Industries was even worse. How bad did it make him seem that he couldn’t stick with the cushy job Daddy gave him? Plus, how could he even compete when compared to his dad? Reliable major company or an unpredictable kid in his mid-twenties? Gee, which to chose?

“Fuck!”

Crossing out the last name on the list, Adrien crumpled the paper and hurled the ball at the far corner of the room. He studied the broken ceiling tiles as he lay on the floor, accepting the ass-kicking the world was giving him.

How could he think that everything would be so easy?

A voice wormed its way to the front of Adrien’s mind.

_“You think that being good-looking will open every door in your way, do you?”_

He’d given a stupid answer at the time. If his current situation had taught him anything, the true answer was obvious. _No._

* * *

 

Chat Noir prided himself in his partnership with Ladybug. The embarrassing story of how that partnership came to be was something he preferred to gloss over.

He was desperate to meet her. There were a number of near misses. Every time Chat arrived, ready to sink his claws into a villain and impress her, Ladybug would be flying away, having already suppressed the danger and handled the situation. Chat would always watch her leave, each time more infatuated than the last.

Such beauty and power. It was a deadly combination that drew him in like catnip.

He finally reached a villain first due to the fact that all hell broke out only a block away from his house. On the scene in a flash, Chat dominated the fight and had the akuma clasped in his hands just as quickly, too eager to meet the girl he’d become captivated with.

Daydreaming about Ladybug must’ve caused his hands to slacken. The akuma had only just escaped through his fingers when a blur of red and black snatched it out of the air.

“Looks like this little guy was about to get away. Guess I’m just in time!” The petite hero was out of breath, probably having made quite the trip to get here. She deftly went about de-evilizing the akuma before turning to face his way. “Who should I be thanking?” Ladybug asked, gratitude obvious in her voice.

Chat startled to attention, suddenly unprepared for Ladybug’s arrival. He fumbled for a moment before attempting to appear cool by casually leaning against his staff. “No thanks required,” he answered with a cheeky grin. “The name’s Chat Noir, though I also answer to Handsome, Prince Charming, My Knight in Shining Armor, and half of the crime-fighting Dream Team.” He paused to take in her baffled expression. “The other half of the Dream Team being you, of course,” he added devilishly.

It took Ladybug a minute to get past all his flirtitude and understand what he was trying to say. Her face scrunched together in confusion, she asked, “You want to fight crime with me?”

“Well, we’re off to a good start,” Chat pointed out, gesturing around at all of the now invisible damage their combined efforts had repaired. “Why not keep the ball rolling?”

Ladybug gave pause at the suggestion. She’d never had a partner before. Seeing his crush’s puzzled appearance, Chat jumped in.

“Oh, come on, think about it! I’d bring so much to the table, what with my strength, charisma, and good looks!” Chat Noir flexed with his best pose, sending Ladybug a playful wink.

The bit was so obviously practiced that Ladybug cracked a smile at the thought of Chat Noir rehearsing in front of a mirror. “Really?” she laughed good-naturedly. “You think that being good-looking will open every door in your way, do you?”

“Fear not, Princess,” Chat shot her an impish grin, “I’ll have no trouble opening the door for you on our dinner date this weekend.”

Eyebrows raised in surprise, Ladybug took one look at the cat-like, wily spark in the black-clad hero’s eyes before throwing her head back laughing. “God, you’re such a _dork!_ ” she cried out happily, clutching her sides, wiping away tears all the while.

Her laughter was mesmerizing. She called him a dork so fondly, Chat immediately wanted to try another pickup line to get her to say it again. Yet, he was so awestruck, he only managed to stand there with his mouth hung open.

“It’s a no to dinner,” Ladybug said when she finally composed herself. Immediately following up the rejection, she broke out another dazzling smile. “But I wouldn’t mind giving the partner thing a shot.”

“Huh?” Chat Noir’s brain spontaneously short-circuited. “Wait, really?”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind having a partner. Two people can cover more area than one, plus these villains seem to keep getting harder to beat. A partner would be a good idea,” she agreed enthusiastically, flitting to stand in front of him, hand outstretched to accept his offer.

Black cats are bad luck? Chat Noir felt like the luckiest person alive.

“It’d be my honor, My Lady,” he answered smoothly, taking her one hand in his and bringing it to meet his lips.

At the last second, she pulled out of his grasp. “There, there, Kitty. Behave yourself,” she jested lightly, pointing an accusatory finger in his face. How did she still manage to be playful and friendly even while shutting him down?

“How dare you, I’ve been told that I have a lovely _cat_ titude and am wonderfully well behaved! ” The cheeky hero countered, feigning insult. “I could purr and curl up in your lap on command. Hell, I don’t even need the command, I’m that great!”

With a bemused shake of her head, and a roll of her eyes, Ladybug wondered aloud a question she would forever continue to ask herself:

“What have I gotten myself into?”


	5. Finding Footing

Chapter 5: Finding Footing

Heroes continue to be heroes whether or not they consider themselves to be.

* * *

Adrien was beginning to identify a trend between the number of jobs he got rejected from and the amount of time he spent sitting out on the fire escape. The fresh air never failed to clear his head and soothe his bruised ego. He came here to lick his wounds and get over the day's shortcomings.

Today, he held a small glass filled with a splash of brandy—not one of his smartest purchases considering his financial standing, but a necessary purchase nevertheless. Adrien lounged on the uncomfortable metal steps, his head craned back to watch his breath materialize and dissipate in the chilly night air.

He'd gotten turned down by a shoe store today. Nothing fancy either, just a regular retailer. To clarify, he wasn't even asking to model for them, simply to work there as an employee. It hadn't mattered that he was familiar with all the designers or ahead of the fashion curve. All it took was him saying that he didn't have any sales or retail experience for the manager to laugh right in his face.

_"You a trust fund baby, kid? I need_ actual _workers here."_

Adrien let out another deep sigh and watched the mist dissolve in the breeze.

Appliances and minimal furniture had drained a decent amount of cash, and failing to find a job for a month and a half wasn't helping his situation. He couldn't keep running down his bank account. So, Adrien had retreated to his thinking place on the fire escape to consider his options.

"McDonald's?" Adrien mumbled the question at the stars and appeared to wait for a response. The speckled blackness seemed content with silence until a shooting star decided to streak across the sky a moment later. "AW! Come on!" the model cried out in agony, slamming his glass on the metal structure with a loud clang. He decided to show how he felt about the star's answer by throwing back the rest of his drink.

"Can't argue with that," Adrien muttered bitterly to himself. "Guess I know where I'm applying tomorrow." It was clearly his last choice, but he needed some kind of income before he could find something more preferable.

No longer having a drink to occupy him, Adrien settled with leaning back, closing his eyes, and passing the time by listening to his breathing mix with the nightlife sounds of the city. He had to focus to hear much of anything past the thumping bass of _Supernova_ , the nightclub next door.

Five minutes passed, and the sounds of a scuffle forced his eyes wide-open.

"S-stop it! Let go of me!"

The plea, muffled by a hand, had Adrien alert and on his feet in an instant. Off in the far shadows of the alleyway cutting between his apartment building and the club, he could make out two forms. He could tell from the voice alone that one was female.

Chat Noir or Adrien, the identity didn't matter when a lovely lady cried out for help.

Adrien flew down the first flight of stairs and, lacking the patience to waste a moment more, threw himself over the railing to jump at the ground. Landing with finesse, he soundlessly took off, urgency spurring him forward. Locked onto his target, Adrien had burning tunnel vision when he saw the drunk predator reaching for his victim's neck.

The take-down took a matter of seconds. There was a sickening series of cracks as the fingers of the man's offending hand were bent backwards. Keeping hold of the hand, Adrien spun the man to face him. A right hook made the bastard see stars, a dazed look consuming him before all lights went out when he was made to kiss an unforgiving brick wall. Adrien relinquished his hold on the man's head, letting him crumple at his feet. The blonde ignored the unconscious heap in favor of aiding the frightened woman.

No longer being forced up against the wall, the woman slumped into Adrien's arms, disoriented and gasping for air. He held her carefully by her shoulders as she attempted to calm herself. Even in the poor lighting, he was able to take in her small, thin frame, eye-catching red dress, and dark locks.

"Are you alright, My Lady?" It was sad that the name was a knee-jerk reaction to the girl's appearance.

The scent of alcohol on his breath was enough to bring the woman back to her senses. Before he could react, Adrien felt the sting of a hand on his face and the stabbing sensation of a stiletto being planted in his foot.

"Don't touch me, you creep!"

Adrien just stood there, absorbing the moment as the girl he saved ran away towards the safety of the fluorescent light cast by the club's entrance. Creep. He rolled the word around his mind and over his tongue, trying to get a better feel for it. Interestingly enough, this was the first time he'd ever been called that. One would think that would've been a more common occurrence considering that up until recently he ran around masked and covered completely in leather.

Rubbing feeling back into his face, Adrien was about to start chuckling to himself over the whole situation when he saw where his rescued dame had run. Looming in the alleyway entrance, a mountain of muscle was keeping the woman steady as she rattled off her story, pointing a finger repeatedly to where he stood. With care, the bouncer, as Adrien was left to assume the menacing man was, steered the woman in the direction of a waiting taxi cab. His eyes never left Adrien. When he started making his way towards him, Adrien put his hands up defensively in automatic response.

"Hey, man, I didn't mean any trouble. I was helping her, not hurting her. She's just probably not in her right state of mind, and I had a drink, and that seemed to scare her off, I promise I wasn't doing anyth—"

The bouncer cut off his embarrassing babbling. "You got a name, Blondie?"

"If she wants to press legal charges, I'm not the person—"

A real no-nonsense kind of guy, he didn't wait for Adrien to finish. "I saw the whole thing, no need to get your panties in a twist, Blondie. I just like to know the names of my neighbors."

Adrien's eyebrows furrowed together. "Wait, you saw..." he trailed off, gesturing around at the whole scene in a confused manner.

"Yeah," the intimidating man confirmed, taking another step closer. Adrien could now better make out his sturdy build, dark hair, and deep set eyes. He looked slightly familiar. The man gestured up at Adrien's window by the fire escape. "I live two doors over. Thought I'd keep tabs on whoever was crazy enough to buy that shithole they've been trying to rent out for years." He nodded back at the club entrance. "I work out front most nights so I've become pretty familiar with your regular pity parties. You scrambling down those steps made enough of a racket for me to come 'round and see you beat the guy's face in and rescue the damsel in distress." His words taking on a mockingly whimsical tone at the end, the bouncer gave Adrien a crooked grin.

Adrien was speechless, in shock for the most part, but also at his unforeseen luck.

"A name, kid?" he repeated his question.

"Adrien," he responded breathlessly.

"Raz." There was a pause as Raz surveyed the surroundings a bit more. Eyeing up the still very much unconscious schmuck, Raz then turned to give Adrien a serious once-over. "You ever do this kind of thing before, Adrien?"

Adrien gave a noncommittal shrug. "A bit."

Raz's eyes lit up.

"Want a job?"

Maybe feeling sorry for himself on the fire escape hadn't been such a bad thing after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The calm before the storm. Next chapter is a doozy... Both in a good and bad way. Get hyped!


	6. A Chance Encounter

Chapter 6: A Chance Encounter

High School Reunion—three words that Adrien never thought would fill him with such dread. Then again, Adrien also never thought he'd return to his old classmates as a part-time alleyway lookout who takes down drunken perverts.

Life was nothing without surprises.

"Adrien? Adrien Agreste, right?"

Good thing Life was full of surprises tonight.

Nathanaël was a sight for sore eyes. His artfully styled red-orange hair paired with the well-cut suit gave off an air of put togetherness that Adrien felt himself lacking. The feeling, thankfully, was contagious. Adrien felt a smile growing on his face as he extended a hand.

"Nathanaël," he greeted, "What a relief. You're the first person I've recognized all night, and I was starting to worry that I'd crashed the wrong high school reunion!"

Nathanaël shook his hand without hesitation, turquoise eyes alight with amusement at Adrien's words. The man standing before Adrien wasn't the boy he remembered. Nathanaël practically glowed, a new confidence exuding from his every pore—a far cry from the shy, timid classmate he recalled having in second year.

Adrien's high school career consisted of a handful of shaky months. He'd been absent off-and-on for the first year due to his unpredictable and demanding career. Constantly leaving Paris for the majority of the school year landed Adrien with a private tutor as his only possible means for keeping up with his studies.

Early second year saw Adrien's return to the public education system, but his attendance was still nowhere near perfect due to work. After two months, his attendance declined for different reasons. Ladybug's disappearance had unquestionably affected Adrien deeply. His social life could attest to that. After the third month of his second year, Adrien returned to his tutor. Permanently this time.

A fair amount of his junior high classmates chose to attend the same high school due to its location and prestige. Not having met many new friends during his tumultuous three months here, Adrien knew coming into this reunion that there would be few faces he'd recognize.

Adrien wondered if he had any right to claim having been a student here.

Even still, here he was. Junior high was the high point before everything flew south. Some subconscious part of Adrien hoped tonight would spark him to find his way back to how he felt all those years ago.

"Crashed? No, no, this is more like a celebrity guest appearance than crashing the party," Nathanaël laughed before adding, "I helped with sending out invitations, and I remember your name being on the list. After not seeing it for so long, it sure stuck out to me. I'm surprised you found the free time to make this thing, Mr. Superstar!"

"Oh, please," Adrien snorted, friendly gesturing up and down at Nathanaël. "If there's a celebrity here, you're the one who's looking the part. You going into the fashion business? What are you doing these days?"

It wasn't meaningless flattery; Nathanaël truly did look like he'd just walked off a runway. Adrien couldn't quite place who he was wearing, but it was undeniably designer.

Nathanaël looked down at his apparel and was instantly aflutter. Color flushed his skin as he rubbed his jawline, seemingly embarrassed.

"Trying to, actually," he answered. "This was a present from a fashion designer I'm hoping to form a partnership with soon." Nathanaël thumbed over the details of his cufflinks as he spoke. "I'm in the business of 3D printing. Designing and modeling—that kind of thing. I print a variety of things for, uh, doctors and architects. Hopefully, I'll be working with designers, too. Now that my business is fairly stable, I was thinking about trying my hand at some original designs. Something more artistic. Equal balance of work and play, right?"

There was a light in Nathanaël's eyes as he spoke. Adrien didn't doubt that the man had found his passion.

A funny thought occurred to the model. "You always were quite the artist. Well, it sounds like you're living the dream; must be every artists' wish for their art to come to life!" Adrien grinned to himself, finding the humor in the similarity of Nathanaël's profession and how his old classmate had fought when akumatized.

"I guess I am living the dream," Nathanaël breathed out with full contentment. He appeared to lose himself in a moment of thought before starting to attention at a sudden song change. Focusing back on Adrien, a renewed interest in his eyes, a waterfall of words seemed to pour out of their own accord. "Um, actually, now that I'm seeing you, would you be interested in getting involved with a project of mine?" Nathanaël's eager offer was cut short by the man muffling himself, covering his mouth with a hand. Utter mortification overwhelmed his previous casual composure. He then gave a quick shake of his head and corrected himself. "Well, no, not _mine_ , er, I obviously need to run everything by some people, and you're probably a very, _very_ busy man with much, _much_ better offers, and who am I even kidding, right?" In only a matter of moments, the confident Nathanaël was gone, and an unsure, shy persona that Adrien was far more familiar with had resurfaced. Nathanaël's eyes darted in every direction, looking for an escape. "A-Actually, nevermind! I was just on my way out!"

"No, wait!" Adrien quickly stopped the man's babbling by grabbing onto his arm, anchoring him so he wouldn't flee. "I'd _love_ to work with you," he reassured sincerely without pause. "I recently left my father's agency and went independent, so I've got more free time than I'm willing to admit." Adrien was straightforwardly honest, for once slightly thankful for getting consistently denied work. Had he actually been busy, would he have completely missed this opportunity to help out an old friend? "You talk with whoever you have to, and you've still got my email if you need me."

All the tension seemed to drain out of Nathanaël. A steady smile returned, and the redhead slowly nodded.

"It was good seeing you again. I'm really glad you could make it."

"I'm really glad you invited me."

* * *

Some acquaintances and a mob of polite fangirls later, Adrien was about ready to take his leave as well. This was a private, personal event and he wasn't about to ruin it all by drawing attention to himself. If the paparazzi showed up he'd get kicked out for sure...

Best to leave them in want and not wanting you to leave, right?

Adrien had almost cleared the front entrance when a sudden cry caused him to jump.

"OH MY GOSH!"

The scream, distinctly feminine and very close in proximity, worried Adrien that he had attracted the exact attention he'd feared. Prepared for the worst, Adrien turned around, smiling and ready to defuse whatever situation that might arise.

His smile faltered, his fear being swiftly replaced with confusion.

At first glance, not a single person appeared concerned with Adrien's existence. But then his eyes fell on the unnaturally rigid form of a woman with her back to him, her fingers threaded anxiously through her hair, and her lips blurring in speech to the open air, as though conversing with a nonexistent classmate.

Cautiously, Adrien approached and began to hear what he could only describe as the crazed ramblings of a woman having an argument with herself.

"—not crossed when I looked earlier! But _of course!_ It'd be stupid to cross your name out if you don't want people to know!... But I know. _Oh my gosh,_ I know! I knew it! I _knew_ I'd know!... This is fate. It has to be! Everything matches up now! The timing is _perfect!_ Everything is perfe- no, not everything, obviously, but _oh my gosh,_ it could be! This could be it! This might fix everything! Oh my gosh, _oh my gosh_... But what if she doesn't want that? I mean, it's not perfect now—nothing is ever perfect! It's good though... Great, actually... Would she want that to change? That'd be a lot. So, _so_ much change... I could do it. I did this much already!... I'm a _genius!..._ No! I'm a _moron!_... AUGH! And she doesn't even know! What kind of a best friend am I?!... Am I doing this? Not doing it? What am I doing?! Do I say something?! _He's right fucking there!_ How can I _not_ say something?! _Oh my gosh_ , I can't believe that—"

"Alya?"

Adrien, pairing together the back of her head and her voice, vocalized his recognition. The woman jumped a clear foot in the air as though ice water had just been poured down the back of her dress. She then froze in place, eyes tightly shut, possibly attempting to conjure the power of invisibility. Unsuccessful, she opened her downcast eyes to look at the illuminated screen held in her trembling hand.

"—this is really happening," she finished her visibly derailed train of thought with a strained squeak. And suddenly, in one fluid motion and a whirl of brown-red hair, the phone disappeared into Alya's clutch and she stood facing Adrien, positively beaming.

"Adrien!" Alya greeted him happily, no hint of her previous crisis to be heard. "I didn't expect to see you here, your name wasn't crossed out on the guest list!"

Eyebrows raised, completely baffled at whatever had just occurred and the sudden shift that made it seem like nothing had even happened, Adrien was too confused to do anything except go with the flow.

"I didn't want to attract the wrong kind of people," he answered simply. Looking to either side of Alya, Adrien felt a strange sense of imbalance. "Did you come here alone? I seem to always remember seeing you with—"

"Marinette?" Alya's voice awkwardly cracked.

Snapping his fingers, Adrien nodded vigorously. "Yes!" He then gestured to Alya's side and motioned as he spoke. "About yay high, dark hair, bright eyes, glued to you at the hip? Did she come here with you? Because I can't help but notice—" Adrien waved his hand through the empty air around Alya. "—the lack of hip-glueage in this scenario."

Alya blinked twice before devolving into a fit of nervous laughter.

"That's her, alright!" Alya answered spiritedly.

There was a long pause as Adrien waited for Alya to finish. He watched her expectantly, but Alya only returned his look with a smile.

"So, is she here?"

"Hm?"

"Is Marinette here? Did she come to the reunion?" Adrien, once again, scanned the room. "I've only run into one, well, now make that _two_ , friends here tonight, so it'd be nice to know if there's someone I've missed."

Alya looked at Adrien with wide eyes.

"Do you want to see her?" Alya asked in a daze.

"I'd love to," Adrien answered automatically.

Alya nodded to herself, yet was slow at processing the motion. Eventually, in almost a zombie-esque fashion, Alya reached out for Adrien's wrist and began to guide him through the crowd.

Marinette.

Adrien associated only positive things with the name. Positive memories, positive personality, positive positivity. That's exactly what he'd come to the reunion for. It was those kinds of positive traits that he himself needed to remember and take with him moving forward.

_Marinette._

Alya was no longer leading him. Her hand released his wrist, and the action brought Adrien out of his head long enough to lock onto yet another familiar turned figure. She was already engaged in a conversation, so Adrien took a moment to simply watch her.

He couldn't help but notice differences.

Her hair was longer. Much longer. It was the most obvious difference to notice, as most superficial details are. Logically, he noticed the dress next. Slick tresses led his eyes to slick cloth. Black, bold, and striking, it demanded attention, and Adrien gladly surrendered. As he watched her move and talk, Adrien thought he could catch red accents hidden about the waist. A part of his brain tugged at memories, the dress not entirely forgotten.

Past the most noticeable distinctions was where Adrien began to second guess himself.

Had the Marinette he'd known really been all that shy? This woman was orchestrating a group exchange with ease. The farthest thing from demure, this woman effectively emanated confidence. She spoke undauntedly, her expression utterly alive with each added word. And her laugh. Freeing was the only word Adrien could grasp that captured its essence. _Her_ essence.

This Marinette was completely unreserved and unrestrained.

_Free._

"This wouldn't happen to be the dress I remember from Fashion Week, would it?"

The words were out the instant Marinette stepped away from her conversation. Adrien couldn't hold them back. Not that he would if he could.

Marinette turned to his voice. Her open, inviting face split into a radiant smile.

The sensation of him and him alone holding her attention had a way of making him feel like the luckiest man alive.

"Well, I would hope so! I remember putting in a whole lot of effort getting it there," she replied with a carefree air.

Scratch that. _Now_ he was the luckiest man alive.

"I would expect no less from you," Adrien commended, grinning despite feeling like he'd just been zapped with electric current.

The old Marinette had never spoken to him like this. So blithely. Adrien had always been aware of the fact that Marinette never quite spoke to him like she spoke to other people, but this couldn't possibly have been what he'd been missing out on, could it? How could he make it so that he'd never miss out on it again?

At least there was finally something he could hold onto. The Marinette he knew was ambitious and hardworking. At least _some_ things can be trusted to be consistent. Maybe this new footing would help him balance under the dizzying effects of this force of nature.

"I was on my way out when Alya caught me and said you were here," Adrien explained. "I honestly couldn't be happier that she did."

A small crinkle formed as Marinette's eyebrows pinched together. Confusion began to mar her face, and immediately Adrien wondered if he'd said something wrong.

Marinette looked over Adrien's shoulder to Alya, whose eyes were moving panickedly between Marinette and Adrien, the color rapidly draining from her face.

A thought dawned on him.

What if Marinette wasn't friends with Alya anymore? Alya had been quite strange when Adrien asked about Marinette earlier, which would make total sense if the two no longer talked. Adrien could understand that much. That had to be it. And that meant... Had he seriously just offended _two_ people so carelessly?

Marinette was subtly shaking her head. "I don't—" She trailed off in thought while looking at Adrien, cocking her head to the side as though debating.

Alya's hand was back around Adrien's wrist, pulling, a touch too intense for comfort.

"Adrien." Alya's voice suddenly sounded very urgent. "Adrien, there are some things that I need to explain. I thought Nino had told you, and I wouldn't have done this if I'd known, but I _didn't_ and I-I should've checked to make sure, _oh my gosh_ why didn't I check?!"

Alya's unnerving rambling took a backseat in Adrien's mind when Marinette's contemplative eyes locked back onto his.

An apology was readily waiting at his lips, but Marinette opened hers first.

"I'm sorry. Have we met before?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now the true story begins! Ladybug might be gone, but Marinette's here to stay! But something's quite obviously off... The full backstory is next chapter, and be warned, it's a long one!
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	7. Unknown

Chapter 7: Unknown

_"Marinette!"_

Her name pierced through the incessant ringing, barely intelligible. The sound was warped and muffled, as though she was underwater.

Underwater.

The thought brought awareness to the fierce burn seizing her torso. Marinette felt her whole body lurch and a sudden gush of air sweep through her. The burning in her lungs stopped. Her body continued to shudder despite the ongoing—though often unsteady—rise and fall of her chest.

Breathing. For some reason, the task felt far more demanding than usual. But she was doing it. Maybe not before, but she was now.

_"Marinette!"_

The ringing became more violent.

Since when were eyelids this heavy?

Marinette could only manage to open them a fraction of an inch and was immediately overwhelmed with colors. Little burst of yellow, white, and black consumed her sight. A small blur of red darted among them, moving at a dizzying speed that made Marinette force her eyes back shut.

_"No! Marinette, stay with me! Please!"_

Sleep came easier than breathing.

She had no sense of time passing, but she felt her nap was interrupted far too soon.

_"—get the head stable... Easy, easy... Lift on three. One..."_

The voices came and went, accompanied with warm hands. Were they warm? Or was she just cold?

Marinette belatedly registered being lifted onto a hard surface. It was moving. She was moving.

" _Miss, can you hear me?"_

"Mm?"

" _Can you tell me how you're feeling? Talk to me."_

Her mouth opened and shut, but coherent words failed to be created.

_I'm fine,_ Marinette somehow felt compelled to say. _Everything will be fine._

* * *

Alya always put her best friend first.

When that meant having to move to act as Marinette's live-in nurse, Alya began packing in a heartbeat.

Marinette's needs first. That meant all of Alya's fears had to be pushed aside. She couldn't afford a mental breakdown when Marinette was already so mentally broken.

The shock of the initial news wasn't all that bad in hindsight.

" _From what we can tell, two areas of her brain sustained damage, resulting in retrograde amnesia."_

_The doctor delivered the news carefully. His tone set her on edge._

" _The blunt force trauma damaged her temporal lobe, causing some long-term memory loss. The extent to which her memory has been compromised and its ability to be recovered will likely become apparent over time."_

_Over time. How much? When would she get her friend back? Alya wanted to ask questions, but remained silent, fearing she wouldn't like the answers._

" _Experiencing memory loss is quite stressful, so while you might want to attempt assisting in recovering memories, keep in mind that too much new information can be extremely overwhelming," the doctor had warned._

" _Also keep in mind that the oxygen deprivation she experienced caused damage to the hippocampus—a key region for the creation of new memories," he explained. "Thankfully, from what we've seen, the damage wasn't so severe as to jeopardize her forming new memories. However, it's fairly clear that her hippocampus isn't performing as well as say it would usually. Normally, it would act as a pathway to piece together separate elements of an old memory to form the complete scene. In a sense, her preset pathways have been damaged, meaning that she'll likely be incapable or have difficulty piecing together her old memories if and when she recovers them."_

_Alya's saving grace was the doctor immediately following up with reassurances that Marinette might fare better with closely held memories._

" _Index entries might be a different story," he promised with a hint of optimism. "Stand-out memories that she's replayed multiple times in her head don't require the hippocampus to act as a link—it's something similar to muscle memory. She should be able to recall these memories more easily."_

" _So Marinette will remember me?"_

_Alya, despite thinking she understood the doctor's meaning hidden beyond all the technical jargon, felt the need to ask the question just to be sure._

_He simply gestured for her to enter the room._

_Marinette was propped upright, expectant as she heard the click of the door swinging open. Alya stood in its frame, fearing the worst yet simultaneously hoping for the best._

_Marinette didn't seem to know what to think of her at first. Jumbled thoughts translated to her face as she considered Alya, looking as though she'd just been presented with a particularly difficult brain teaser._

" _Hi," Marinette eventually greeted amidst her confusion._

_Without thinking, Alya had her best friend wrapped tightly in a desperate hug. It was an unconscious action brought on by her urgent need to affirm that,_ yes _, Marinette truly was here in her arms, not off dead in some obscure alleyway._

" _Hi," Alya choked back into Marinette's shoulder._

_Breath suddenly hitching, Marinette momentarily froze. Alya couldn't distinguish which of them was trembling more, too focused on the sensation of two arms taking hold and drawing her in further._

" _Hi," Marinette repeated, a sureness now there that she lacked before. An immeasurable amount of emotions were packed into that one word. Was a human being even equipped to feel so much at once?_

_The cool dampness of Marinette's tears soaking through Alya's t-shirt and the body-wracking sobs that followed was enough to convince Alya:_

_Marinette_ was _here._

_Alya wasn't going to let that change anytime soon._

Marinette's parents, bless them, insisted their daughter would receive the best treatment. The best treatment facility cost quite the pretty penny, of course, but that didn't deter them.

Marinette became a full-time patient, her parents working extreme over-time to afford such a thing. She and Alya lived in the facility for several months. Alya's presence was vital in her friend's recovery process. Given the circumstances, Alya was the person who knew Marinette the best—better than even Marinette herself.

Getting Marinette back to her old self—or the closest version that existed—was a slow, taxing process for both girls.

Alya tried not to let it show. But it was unnerving. The sizeable chunk of memory that Marinette was missing extended all the way back to include when she first met Alya. It was unsettling to walk Marinette through everything—the past couple of years, her interests, daily life, _their entire friendship_. Marinette would listen diligently, but when repeating back the information it sounded as though the girl was describing aspects of another person's life. There was a clear disconnect.

Triggering memories was the fastest way to bridge the gap. It usually demanded very specific triggers, and Alya quickly found that Marinette's senses—touch, taste, smell, and especially sight and hearing—were the easiest ways to draw out lost memories.

It wasn't just enough for Alya to _tell_ Marinette about something that happened; Marinette needed to _experience_ it.

"Who are they?" Marinette asked, giving the CD she was holding a puzzled look.

Alya had brought another box of her personal items. It had become a regular practice for the brunette, who was slowly cycling through Marinette's stuff and bringing whatever she felt would stand a chance of being a sufficient trigger.

"They're your favorite band," Alya supplied with a backward glance, not missing a beat. She didn't elaborate further than that.

"Hm," Marinette hummed in acknowledgement before returning it to the box with a shrug. "Never heard of them."

Alya didn't push the issue. These kinds of things tended to sort themselves out.

The following week, Alya was allowed for the first time to drive Marinette with her to the supermarket. Without prompting, Marinette's fingers were attempting to reason with the temperamental radio, twisting the dial to find what had been her favorite station.

An unconscious, small smile grew on Alya's face. Marinette hadn't been in her car since the accident. Yet, Marinette fell into her old routine, somehow following the familiar call that was her and Alya's trademark car jam sessions.

After a barrage of static, an unmistakable song came on. Marinette didn't pause, immediately producing flawless, if not slightly off-key, lyrics to her favorite band's number one hit.

The CD Alya brought to Marinette hadn't been played once.

Alya, looking over to see Marinette doing her old, poorly self-choreographed dance in the passenger seat, felt uncontrollable laughter escape her. Happily, at the top of her lungs, Alya joined in.

Marinette disjointedly remembering Alya and the time they'd spent together one memory at a time was difficult, but at times like this, Alya didn't mind so much.

_She got to befriend Marinette all over again._

Now, more than ever, Alya realized how strongly she loved and cherished Marinette—this whole experience had impossibly brought them closer.

* * *

Ladybug's secret identity didn't blindside Alya. She, as the ever so dedicated creator of _Ladyblog,_ would've needed to be brain dead to look past the glaring centerpiece of evidence:

Ladybug's disappearance and Marinette's memory loss. According to Alya's calculations, both events occurred around the same time and place.

So, no, discovering Ladybug's identity didn't come as a surprise. Through piecing together the media's knowledge of Ladybug's last confirmed sighting and the circumstances Marinette was found in—the latter being known only to Alya and Marinette's parents—Alya's suspicions were sound enough to form a good guess.

Marinette was Ladybug.

Alya didn't have physical proof until she found Marinette's journal. Only then did she allow herself to acknowledge her suspicions as truth. The truth, though expected, still came as a shock. A mind-blowing, world-changing, perspective-altering shock that left Alya feeling more satisfaction and pride than she had ever felt.

It didn't bother Alya that Marinette had kept it secret or that she'd failed to notice something so obvious when it was right under her nose. None of that mattered, because it all paled in comparison to the sublime _happiness_ that the news made her feel.

_Marinette_ was _Ladybug_.

There was nobody more perfect to don the spotted mask in Alya's eyes.

This level of happiness was otherworldly, but Alya repeatedly proved its realness with every entry she read of Marinette's diary. She had stumbled across it while searching for possible memory triggers in Marinette's room. The forgotten journal would definitely hold strong enough memories for Marinette to grasp onto. Initially, Alya thought nothing more of the secret-filled book.

But then she _read_ those secrets.

Page after page, Alya read, quickly making the venture from one cover to the other. She _re_ read, making sure she didn't misunderstand. But, there it was, written in black and white—her best friend and favorite hero were _the same person_.

And that was only _half_ of it.

_Chat warned me that he'd be out of town on and off for a while... It makes me nervous. Him not being around. Sure, it'll be a little more difficult, but I can probably manage for a while with some additional help from the police. Still, I hope he comes back soon._

_All things considered, I guess that news is just the rotten cherry on top of my awful week. With Adrien no longer at school, I've only seen him a handful of times. That is, if you count watching him on televised interviews and in commercials. I've been following his work as best as I can with midterms hanging over my head. I really need to polish up on my schedule-tracking skills. Get it together, Marinette! You're slacking!_

That was the first link. Marinette obviously hadn't seen it at the time. A week of entries later, Alya saw the second piece fall into place.

_I finally caught a glimpse of Adrien! Of course, I mean in the actual flesh, not as a mess of pixels for once. My jogging route happens to go past Adrien's house (What a coincidence!), and I finally caught a glimpse of him out in his front yard! I guess I'll keep running that route then! He should be back for a month, after all._

_I think Chat got back a couple days ago, too. There hasn't been an incident, so I haven't seen him, but I think he said he would be back the... tenth? I really should've marked it on the calendar. Still, it feels good knowing he's around even if we haven't met up yet. It's... Comforting._

Months pass.

The first time, Marinette joked and laughed it off.

_You know, I actually started bothering to mark the dates Chat leaves and returns. I put these cute, little paw stickers on the calendar and everything. And it's the funniest thing! I have my Adrien Calendar right next to my normal one, and for the past couple of weeks, I noticed that the paws seem to line up almost_ exactly _with the gold stars for Adrien's work schedule._

_So, ever since I've noticed, I can't help but feel more excited than usual when Adrien is scheduled to return, thinking it means that_ both _of them are back. Ha! Why am I even bothering with two calendars? I'm basically marking the same event twice!_

_It's a crazy coincidence, obviously, but still... What are the odds!_

There were many entries following that initial one where it was obvious that Marinette was flipping between ignorance, denial, and outright suspicion.

_Chat wasn't really clear when I asked him about why he's traveling so much._

_Adrien is almost always working. Half of his calendar is covered in stars! How could some of them_ not _line up with Chat's paw stickers? It can't even be considered a coincidence at that rate!_

_Their personalities are way too different. They don't even compare._

And then, the comparisons began.

_Chat twirls his staff... Adrien would twirl his pencil in class. Oh, geez, that's weird. I'm being weird again._

_Adrien models. Chat, well... He's handsome, I guess. Objectively. Okay, theoretically, he might make it as a paid pretty person. I just don't see it happening. If that head of his got any bigger, it'd explode!_

_Nobody, especially my precious Adrien, would make those dumb puns like Chat... Well, it might actually be okay if Adrien did it... Might actually be cute..._

_Adrien fell asleep one time in class. His snores sounded like purring... Oh, God! Marinette that's just downright creepy!_

The realization was spelled out on a particularly abused page, one that you could tell had been written on and erased one too many times. In shakily printed letters, it read:

_They're the same person._

The critical piece of evidence that must've pushed Marinette over the edge wasn't documented, but Alya deduced the final puzzle piece by researching the diary entry's date.

It had been the night of a costume party that Chloe threw. Alya recalled an instant where the blonde girl had been trying to pin the iconic Chat Noir mask to the model, wanting to have a partner to her Ladybug costume.

She remembered Adrien hurriedly ripping the mask from his face and laughing it off as he politely declined. Alya had attempted to snap a quick, cute picture before he did, but Marinette's hand had darted into frame at the last second, blocking the shot.

One look over her shoulder to see a slightly shaken Adrien was all it took to prompt Marinette's request:

" _Can we leave early? I'm not feeling too well."_

Reflecting on the moment gave Alya a warm feeling. Marinette, mere moments after the truth dawned on her, was shielding Adrien's secret just as carefully as she would her own.

Alya intended to do the very same. All the secrets that Marinette had guarded were now Alya's to protect. Despite both identities weighing on her shoulders, Alya felt no pressure; she would never fail her friend.

* * *

Marinette being released from care and returning home marked great progress, but that progress was quickly overshadowed by an unsettling discovery.

"Doc said you have to be reintroduced slowly, so you're supposed to only unpack one box of belongings per day," Alya explained to her friend as Marinette surveyed the boxes littering the floor of her room.

"Aw, just one box? Come on, I can do better than that! I'm not made of glass, you know, I'm not gonna self-destruct every time I remember something!"

"You had a mental breakdown just the other day when you passed in front of the video game store," Alya pointed out.

"Hey! If you were suddenly bombarded with the memories of every torturous loss at your father's hands, you'd lose your mind, too!" Marinette swiftly defended, but silently conceded as she plopped herself down in front of the box Alya had presented.

As Marinette steadily worked her way through its contents, Alya smiled to herself. Marinette was right—she was getting stronger. While she still had breakdowns at certain information overloads, the episodes were becoming far less frequent. At this rate, Alya was certain they'd have Marinette back in school within two months. Going through a box of memories a day, slowly reintroducing Marinette to acquaintances and classmates, and finally helping Marinette read through her diary entries. That was Alya's plan. By the end of it, Marinette will have filled in the major missing pieces of her life and finally be able to push forward into the future.

"Finished!" Marinette announced.

Alya snapped out of her daydream to see that Marinette had completely emptied the contents of the box.

"And what did I tell you! See, not self-destructing," Marinette added proudly as she surveyed the various memory-linked objects in front of her. "Nothing in here was even that strong of a memory, I don't get why you were worried."

"No, no, there _was_ something." Alya frowned, then kneeled down beside Marinette and began shuffling through the mess. She _knew_ what was in each box. She'd packed them, after all.

"This." Alya produced a magazine clipping from the pile.

Marinette turned the clipping, considering it. Her brows furrowed together, making for a clearly puzzled expression.

"I'm not getting a connection," Marinette finally said, still staring intently at the fashion magazine photo. "Did I design something like this?... Wait! Is this mine? Did I make this outfit?! No, that can't be it. I'd remember something as exciting as having one of my designs produced by such a major company." Marinette trailed off uncertainly.

Alya stared at her friend, a mixture of bewilderment and foreboding building.

"You know what," Alya cut in to intercept Marinette's train of thought. There was an almost unnoticeable tremor to her voice. "How about one more box. To hell with what Doc said, you haven't even broken a sweat."

Alya picked a second box, but before Marinette could begin sifting through it, Alya pulled out a poster on top. "Starting with this," she declared.

Marinette humored her demand, unrolling the poster and looking it over. She gave it the same expression as the magazine clipping. "More fashion related stuff? I remembered this stuff forever ago, Alya. I'm up to snuff on fashion and design knowledge, trust me," Marinette laughed.

"It's not the outfit, it's the model."

Marinette tore her eyes away from the outfit long enough to look at the person donning the clothes. "OH!" she cried out. Marinette dipped to swipe the forgotten clipping off the ground and held it next to the poster. "It's the same guy!"

The mounting tension in Alya's shoulders disappeared at Marinette's reaction. That was the response she'd been looking for.

"Adrien Agreste." Marinette read the name from the bottom of the poster. She repeated, rolling the name around, trying it on for size. A long pause followed as she read the planes of his face and analyzed the scope of his eyes.

Then, she tore her eyes away from the image with ease before claiming, "Nope, doesn't ring a bell."

* * *

"A repressed memory is the most likely case."

Alya nodded at the doctor's words. "I came to a similar conclusion," she agreed. "But I wanted a professional opinion."

The man nodded and wove his fingers together. "Traumatic events can often cause the brain to suppress related stressful memories. Some say it's done out of mental self-protection."

"Right," Alya followed. "So, this guy. He was a big part of her life, to the point that I assumed she'd remember him the second I showed her a picture. And now I've gone through countless magazines and yearbooks with her, but she still doesn't have a single connection."

Alya ran her hands through her hair to channel the nerves. "She made a connection with practically _every other person_ except him, no matter how little she knew the person."

"You said he was likely there during the accident?" he asked.

"Yes." The word held conviction. Adrien hadn't been at the accident, but she was positive Chat Noir had. Marinette had already come to think of them as the same person.

"Well, it's possible that she has strongly repressed the memory of the accident itself and anything that could remind her of it. With the state of her brain already, it wouldn't be that difficult for something like that to happen."

There it was. The confirmation of something that Alya was fearing since first bringing Marinette home. Alya had fought the truth for too long. She'd kept feeding Marinette anything possibly linked with the event, showing her everything from her once favorite interviews of Adrien, to newspaper covers showcasing Paris's famous heroes, to every last post of _Ladyblog_.

Nothing worked.

Everything to do with the accident—Ladybug, Chat Noir, and by association, Adrien—everything had been sealed away.

Alya, quickly wiping her clammy hands on her pants, stood to shake the doctor's hand.

"Thank you for your time."

* * *

It was like they never existed in the first place.

Marinette returned to school almost seamlessly, socially and academically falling into line with her classmates without pause. Months passed, and Marinette flourished. Alya's greatest worry—that her friend would end up living a shell of her previous life as a result of missing memories—was completely unfounded.

Marinette's new life grew around the empty spaces left by her forgotten identity of Ladybug, her partner Chat Noir, and his true identity, Adrien. She made the transition without difficulty. In fact, the alternative route was where difficulty arose. Any attempt at intense probing of Marinette's repressed memories would bring on drowsiness, nausea, and extreme headaches. Truly, on some level, Marinette's brain had locked away everything involving her accident, violently rejecting letting any of that information be pried away.

That didn't stop Alya from trying. Marinette seeing and talking to Adrien in person, she determined, might be the strongest chance of breaking that lock.

"What do you mean he's _gone_?"

"He's gone. That's what I mean," came Nino's gruff answer through the phone. "It's been forever since I last talked to him."

Alya shook her head in disbelief. "Listen, I know that he decided to go back to his private tutor, but even if he's not coming to school, aren't you still able to reach him? It's important."

"Have you called his number?"

"Yeah, it goes straight to answering machine which says—"

"' _You've reached Adrien Agreste's personal line. I am not available. I am currently taking some personal time due to recent events. I ask not to be contacted during this time. Thank you for your concern. Do not leave a message,_ '" Nino rattled off automatically, not needing to pause for breath. "All numbers I have to contact him have been either disconnected or changed except for that one. The answering machine message has been the same for weeks."

Adrien was hurting. Of course he was hurting, Alya winced at the painful thought.

"What I need to talk to him about concerns him getting back to normal!" Alya continued to implore.

There was a long, strained pause on Nino's end. "Alya, he's not going to care about getting back to normal. All he cares about right now is being alone. We've all tried to reach out to help... He doesn't want help. He just wants to suffer in silence."

" _Adrien doesn't have to be suffering!_ Are you not hearing what I'm telling you?!"

" _He's cut us out, okay!_ " Nino snapped, his tone chilling. "That's a first for you, huh? Well, this is what being cut out feels like!"

The remark slapped Alya straight across the face—he wasn't talking about Adrien anymore. Letting out a choked gasp, Alya replied, "So _that's_ what you're angry about? Me leaving to take care of Marinette? _Our_ friend? She _needed_ me, Nino! She still needs me even now!"

" _I'm sorry,_ I didn't realize that helping one friend required all other important people in your life vanishing off the face of the earth!" came Nino's scorching response. "How do you think it fucking feels? You going away to play doctor, and then Adrien up and disappears on me? And I'm just abandoned, left wondering if I should keep waiting for nothing to change? That's fucking _sick_ , Alya, and I'm not living like that anymore."

Alya was left spinning at his words. After several failed attempts at speaking, she finally managed. "So, what, is this you _breaking up with me_?"

She had the phone pressed fiercely to her ear to make out Nino's sigh. The following break in conversation felt both infinitely long and savagely short.

"I'm transferring schools," he finally answered. It was the first that Alya was hearing of the news. Why hadn't he told her sooner? "I'll be all the way across France. With that kind of distance, we were bound to break up anyway."

"We could work around—"

"We're _already_ working around so much, and look how that ended up." His voice already sounded disconnected, as though he was no longer on the phone. "You know, as much as I hate the fact that Adrien's gone, I understand why... We both need space to figure everything out."

Sitting in the aftermath of their conversation that day, Alya felt the truth of her situation slowly taking hold—she was in this alone.

* * *

"Do you ever wish you could go back to how things were before?"

The question slipped out of Alya without her noticing. The magazine in her hand was what triggered her curiosity. On its cover was none other than Adrien Agreste, closely embracing a female model, the two both dressed to sell their look.

He seemed happy. It was the first time Alya was seeing her old classmate on a cover since him taking his personal leave. And he looked happy. He looked like his normal, old self. Maybe he _was_ back to normal, fully recovered from his emotional turmoil.

At the back of Alya's mind, however, lurked the fact that this cover didn't necessarily reflect the real Adrien. There was a world of a difference between _selling_ happy and genuinely _being_ happy. Her question then voiced itself, unable to help wondering the same of Marinette. Was she actually happy how she was now, or was she only acting that way, making the most of what she had, but knowing that it's only a fraction of who she once was?

Marinette took pause in her intricate stitchwork. "No, I don't think I would. I'm fine how I am. Why do you ask?"

"Just wondering."

Marinette chuckled as she turned her focus back to her project. "Worrying, you mean."

"I can't help but worry! Can you blame me?!" Alya cried exasperatedly, flopping backwards onto Marinette's bed.

"No, but I still wish you'd worry less," Marinette said good-humoredly as she cocked her head to consider the dress at a different angle.

"Well, then help me worry less!" Alya pleaded, waving her arms helplessly above her head. "I wouldn't be able to live with myself if you're settling for less when I could've tried to do something about it!"

"Alya, how many times do I have to tell you?" Marinette asked, swiveling around in her chair to set Alya straight. Taking her friend's hands in hers and looking her dead in the eye, Marinette said, "Read my lips—I'm so, _so_ happy. And I'm happy how I am _now_. Maybe I don't know how that compares with how I was before, but I don't think that matters! I might not be exactly the same person, but I am who I am."

Squeezing Alya's hand tightly, Marinette assured, "I'm not going to live my life like I have a handicap. I'm not broken! You don't need to think that you're in charge of piecing together the missing parts of my life! As far as I'm concerned, there _aren't_ any missing parts; my life is whole and happy as is. Sure, I could remember additional things down the line, and whatever happens, happens, but I don't want to try going out of my way to draw out memories anymore."

Marinette looked wounded as she thought of that possibility: a future solely dedicated to tracking down every trace of her old self. "We did that for so long, and I don't think I could make myself do it any longer. It's so much pain and stress, not to mention the endless letdowns if I fail to remember anything."

"So, _please_ ," Marinette pleaded. " _Please_ promise me that you'll let it go. That you won't meddle. That you'll let everything happen naturally."

"That's what you want?" Alya asked, slightly dazed.

Marinette gave a sure nod. "That's what I want."

Alya took one more look at the magazine cover and understood. This wasn't her place. How either Adrien or Marinette lived their lives wasn't her choice to make, it was theirs.

Adrien had made his choice, and now Marinette had made hers.

"I promise."

* * *

Alya's promise held for nearly five and a half years—five and a half quite beautifully chaotic years, if she might add.

The amount of remarkable events that happened in that small time frame was enough to fill a lifetime. Marinette had only dreamed of such a thing.

Winning her school's humble fashion contest didn't seem like much in the grand scheme of things, but having her work recognized by a panel with a fashion celebrity guest judge was something else entirely. Being asked by that same celebrity to make them a similar piece to wear to an award show lit the fuse that skyrocketed Marinette's career in the fashion world.

Fresh from graduating high school, Marinette was flung into five and a half years of tireless designing, having her creations star in fashion spreads, gaining critical acclaim, and getting two successful clothing lines under her belt, with yet another on its way. Such success as an independent designer has rarely heard of, making it all the more impressive. Alya, of course, had a great hand in Marinette's achievements as her marketing manager, publicist, and go-to girl for opinions and advice.

And through every moment of chaos those past five and a half years, Alya had kept her promise. Until today.

"Alya! He said it's open right on the desk. Can you not find it?" Marinette's muffled voice made its way from the waiting car outside.

The item in question, Nathanaël's laptop, was directly in front of her. "No, not yet! Someone must have moved it!" Alya shouted back, voice as steady as feasibly possible.

_HS Reunion Guest List_. The received email had caught Alya's eye, and kept her captive. Before she knew it, she had clicked on the attached file. Scrolling quickly down the alphabetically sorted names with accompanying contact information, Alya quickly found the name she was searching for.

_Adrien Agreste_. There followed an email address, number of years attended, and his invitation status: _Do Not Invite_.

"Hurry! The venue is only open until six!"

"Still looking!"

Alya read and reread the three words before scanning the rest of the list. Only students who had attended more than one year were invited, exceptions being made only if the one year was senior year. Adrien was marked as one year. Apparently, his shaky attendance wasn't enough to qualify.

Alya decided to make him a special exception.

Quivering fingers moved to edit the document, pressing the backspace button until only one word remained: _Invited._

_This isn't meddling,_ Alya tried to convince herself. _Adrien attended over a year, he deserves an invitation! The email might not even get to him, but at least he's been given a chance._ Alya quickly packed up Nathanaël's laptop and rushed outside to join them. At the back of her mind lurked the possibility that, should the stars align, Marinette might finally meet Adrien.

_Marinette wants to live her life naturally_ , Alya reminded herself. _There's nothing more natural than running into old friends at a high school reunion._

In no part of Alya's mind did she ever think of the possible consequences of her actions.

* * *

They were outside now, a safe distance away from the other guests for Alya to drop the memory loss bomb.

"There was a chance that she would remember you, but—"

"I just blew that chance?" Adrien cut Alya off. She didn't answer the question directly, but with the poorly-concealed regret in her eyes, she might as well have.

Breath seemed to momentarily elude him, and Adrien had to remind himself to inhale the crisp night air, hoping it would ground him. It didn't.

"That's, um, that's—" Adrien fought the tremor in his voice by clearing his throat. "That's awful. Her losing her memory, I mean, not her forgetting me. That, uh, that's totally out of her control, right? Who could blame her for not remembering someone? Something like that's bound to happen!"

He could tell his attempt at composure failed when he could see pity in Alya's eyes.

"Guess I just happened to pull the short stick, huh?" Adrien finished weakly.

Alya sadly shook her head. "There have been others. A handful that I've reintroduced to her and she's failed to remember." Alya neglected to mention that all of these people were barely known to Marinette in the first place. She spared him that one detail. "All of them knew what they were getting into, though. All of them knew her condition and that there was a chance she wouldn't remember them. Trust me, I would have _never_ done this if I'd known Nino hadn't told you. I-I know that things were all very stressed right around when it happened, between mine and Nino's separation and everything you were going through at the time, but I thought..." Alya trailed off, still processing the shock of the moment. "I thought he wouldn't have been so bitterly selfish about me leaving that he would have actually _explained_ why Marinette and I left school. I should've known better!... He felt shut out by everyone else, so he did the exact same thing in response."

"I don't blame him. Those kinds of circumstances," Adrien spoke halfheartedly from experience, "They get the best of us sometimes. Turn us into something we're not."

Unbeknownst to Adrien, Alya knew where the pain in his voice stemmed from.

"I'm so sorry."

_I'm sorry for everything,_ Alya wanted to say.

"No! No, no, no! Don't be!" Adrien painted on his most well-worn smile—the kind that didn't quite reach his eyes. "None of this is your fault!"

_But it was._

"I'm fine," Adrien lied, his words empty.

In reality, Adrien was the farthest thing from fine. Because, for the first time in a long time, Adrien had been sure of himself. In that one moment he'd shared with Marinette, some part of him felt sure. Sure of who he was. Sure of how he felt. Sure of what he wanted to do with his life. He couldn't quite put a finger on what any of those things were, or why he felt like he'd undergone such a sudden revelation, but that didn't matter. All that mattered was that despite all the uncertainties he'd struggled with these past couple of years, somehow, seeing Marinette had made him feel like he was doing something right.

Of course, with his luck, it was inevitable for that feeling to get ripped away.

"We could go back and see if—"

"No," Adrien quickly shied away from Alya's offer. Blinking rapidly, he maintained shaky control. "I really should be going. Marinette, uh, she's got this whole new life going for her, and it's got to be unnerving to be around complete strangers that know everything about you, so I should, I should go."

This always seemed to be how things went for Adrien—he'd find a good thing only to have it ripped away from him. Only, in this case, it'd been ripped away from him years ago without him knowing, and only now did he get to know what he lost.

"Adrien, you don't have to do this," Alya quickly pleaded, reaching out a hand.

Adrien took it and squeezed. "If it's what's best for Marinette, then I do."

Knowing she was better off without him didn't make walking away any easier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew! Well, there ya go. Filled in a good amount of blanks in this monster of a chapter!
> 
> Marinette discovered the truth, but now has forgotten it, Alya knows everything, and poor little Adrien can't seem to catch a break... Yet, anyway. Fear not, things will be looking up soon!
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	8. Watching Over

Chapter 8: Watching Over

"Kid, you've gotta be kidding me. You're standing there with your mouth hung open like a fool. I swear, you start drooling and I'm dropping your sorry ass. Hero? More like zero. Why do I even bother sticking around!"

Plagg's tail thumped rhythmically against the glass of the skylight, a sign of his increasing embarrassment that this was the man he chose to wield his power. The vibration of the bass, blinding flares of unnaturally colored lights, and muffled laughter of the party below did nothing to help his declining mood. Maybe if he was able to indulge in some of those appetizers over at the refreshment table, it'd be a different story.

"You're hopeless," Plagg muttered in Adrien's direction as a fond goodbye, a smirk tugging at his lips. Giving his partner one last look, he floated away from the glass and prepared to fly off, perhaps to seek out some delicious cheese shop to host him for the night.

"Plagg?"

The unmistakable, feminine voice stopped him dead in his tracks.

"Plagg! What are you doing here?" Tikki asked, swooping in close to make sure her eyes weren't playing tricks on her.

"Tikki?" Surprise rang clear in Plagg's voice. "Long time no see. What are the odds?"

Slim to none. They hadn't seen each other in person for over a century. An impossibly long time, so it might seem, but there existed usually very small, spaced out windows of opportunity between partners for the two kwami to run into each other. Now being one of them.

"Yeah, I don't believe it," Tikki replied in astonishment. "So you finally went your separate ways with Chat Noir? I'm surprised you went solo with him for so long."

Plagg twitched. The subject was still tender. "I guess I can say the same about how long you've taken searching for a new Ladybug. Still looking, I take it?"

Tikki was instantly set aflutter by his question. "A-Ah! Yes! Can't quite find the perfect match. But, you know how it is, can't rush perfection!"

"...Right."

When fully dedicated to searching, a kwami might find their partner in anywhere between a single week and several decades. Sure, rushing to find the perfect partner wasn't a good thing; kwami were encouraged to take their time. That is, if their time was being well-spent. However, if the kwami chose to dawdle along and waste that time, that was another story.

And, of course, that was exactly what Plagg was doing. Figures.

"So, is he the one? Your new Chat Noir?"

"Huh?" Plagg shook himself to attention to see Tikki pointing out a figure below.

"That one. The guy who your eyes were glued to while spaced out. No, wait, is that?... You're waiting on _Adrien Agreste?_ " Tikki fell into a mixture of snorts and high-pitched laughter. "Well, isn't that quite a funny twist of fate!"

Plagg, meanwhile, broke out in a cold sweat. He'd been too obvious. Tikki knew he was watching him, there was no denying that. And she was right. He _was_ waiting on Adrien Agreste—waiting on him to be ready to reform a partnership, that was. Which was a much different kind of "waiting on" than what Tikki assumed. Her kind of "waiting on" was the final part of the partner choosing process, where a kwami waits for the most suitable time to begin a partnership with their chosen human. Keyword there being _begin_. Not _reform_. There was an unwritten rule for kwami to never waste time trying to reform a severed partnership. Plagg never was one for rules... But he knew Tikki was.

That left Plagg with only one option.

"Yeah, I've been following Blondie for about a week now," Plagg lied seamlessly. "He's not in the best mental-emotional state right now, though, so I could be waiting on him for a while."

_Perfect. Now she won't question me following him around while not doing anything to approach him. Hardly made any of that up either. I'm golden!_

Smug with his flawless cover, Plagg felt ballsy enough to counter-question Tikki. "What about you, huh? You following someone at this party, too?"

"W-What?!" Tikki turned rigid and, if even possible, a brighter shade of red.

"That's a resounding _yes_ ," Plagg quipped, giving a cheshire grin. "No need to be embarrassed. Who is she? Or is it a he this time? You do tend to get more flustered with guys."

"It's not a guy!" Tikki cried out, clearly uncomfortable.

"Well, then, do I need to point out every girl in the room, or are you gonna give me a hint? I'm not much for 'I Spy'."

"Her!" Tikki reluctantly exploded, singling out Marinette. As Plagg followed her finger, Tikki beat her wings anxiously, every part of her rejecting the lies she was about to spin.

"Ha! Couldn't have picked her better myself!" Plagg burst out. "That woman has reduced my kid to a puddle in under a minute. Good, he'll need that kind of girl to keep him in check. She's got my stamp of approval, alright. Got quite a similar vibe to the last one, if you ask me."

Tikki's nervous laughter went unnoticed.

"What's holding ya back? She seems just right to me." Plagg asked once he finished evaluating.

Tikki swallowed loudly. "I've been following her for a while. She's got some memory issues and I'm just waiting for her to stabilize."

A half lie. It was the best she could manage.

"Wow, that's some shit luck." Plagg gave the woman another look. She seemed quite stable. Then again, Adrien's issues lurked below the surface. He shouldn't be so quick to judge. "Well, if there's an upside to any of this, it looks like we might just end up waiting it out together. These two seem to be hitting it off just fine, and next thing ya know—wait, shit, where'd they go?"

There was a noticeable gap in the dance floor where their prospective "new" partners once stood. After briefly searching the crowd, the kwami flew around front to catch the tail end of Alya breaking the news to Adrien.

Plagg's face automatically fell to match his partner's. Just as he thought something was finally going right, Plagg got to witness yet another piece of Adrien's heart be broken. Tikki's comforting hand found its way to Plagg's shoulder, and while he might have normally shrugged it off, the kwami let it rest there.

"We might be left waiting a while," Plagg admitted solemnly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tikki and Plagg are back, guys! And what's the first thing they do after being apart so long? Lie, of course! Both Tikki and Plagg have decided to commit a social taboo among kwami and stick around for the opportune moment to rejoin their old partners, and they each intend to get away with it by pretending that Marinette and Adrien are actually the new, soon-to-be Ladybug and Chat Noir and not the dynamic duo from seven years ago. Marinette kept Chat Noir's secret identity from even Tikki, and Plagg hardly seems to remember Adrien's old classmate... How long will it take for them to connect the dots between secret identities and unravel the web of lies surrounding their past partners?
> 
> The plot's about to take another turn.
> 
> I love me some foreshadowing... How well have you been paying attention?


	9. Forget What's Forgotten

Chapter 9: Forget What's Forgotten

"You okay?"

"Obviously!" The reply was a tad too enthusiastic and slightly slurred.

"Let me rephrase," Marinette tried again after a quick eye-roll. "You're _not_ okay. Statement, not a question. You're never okay when you're day drinking, Alya. So, are you going to tell me what's wrong?"

Alya held up a finger, demanding a pause as she brought the small, complimentary bottle of champagne gifted by the hotel to her mouth. The forgiving liquid was plucked away just as it ghosted her lips.

"Is this about yesterday? The reunion?" Marinette fished, returning the bottle to its rightful place in the fridge. Receiving no response, she turned around to see Alya blankly staring at her now empty hand.

"Is this about Adrien Agreste?" Marinette tried again.

Alya's hand, once grasping at open air, snapped to attention at the name and whirled around to point accusingly at Marinette.

_"You remember!"_ Her exclamation was punctuated with the clinking of glass, causing Marinette to frown and investigate. The designer circled the couch to find two already empty, identical glass bottles hidden between Alya and the vacuum that was the couch cushions.

" _Two_ , Alya? We have a meeting in less than an hour," Marinette chastised.

"Don't change the subject! You remember him!" Alya declared, her face shining with glee.

"So Adrien Agreste _is_ what this is about," Marinette stated as she got rid of the bottles before returning to sit across from Alya. "Listen, I don't remember him. I know _of_ him. Name me one person in the fashion industry that doesn't." The gleeful look melted off of Alya's face, replaced with realization. "See?" Marinette asked. "Exactly. And the whole thing is my fault anyway. You shouldn't be sitting here drinking over my mistake. Trust me, I'm already kicking myself enough as it is."

This addition sent Alya for a loop. "Wait, what?"

"We must've run into him really briefly. Probably at some super chaotic event. But still, that's no excuse for forgetting meeting him. Gah! Connections are everything, and to know someone of his popularity... I mean, _he_ remembered meeting me, and _you_ remembered meeting him, and there I am, a complete unprofessional _idiot_ that somehow blanked on the entire interaction!"

Alya blinked slowly. No, it wasn't the alcohol. She definitely heard that right. "Wait, _what?"_ Alya repeated, more forcefully this time.

"Adrien Agreste?" Marinette spoke slowly, as though spelling it out. "Star model and fashion icon? The guest at the reunion? I'm talking about how I somehow forgot meeting him at one of my shows."

_"Guest at the reunion?!"_ Alya exploded. "You thought he was a _guest?"_

"A celebrity guest, yeah, that's the idea."

"YOU WENT TO SCHOOL WITH HIM! HE WAS YOUR CLASSMATE!" Dead silence followed the outburst. Alya continued. "Adrien wasn't some celebrity guest, he was a former student there for the reunion just like everyone else!"

A new look of horror dawned on Marinette. "So when you thought I remembered him—"

"I thought you _remember_ remembered him," Alya cut her off. "You failed to remember him not long after your accident. Do you remember that at least? Seven years ago? Me desperately showing you class photos, yearbooks, and magazines?"

Marinette ran a hand through her hair, at a loss. Seven years was a lifetime ago, but she could vaguely remember what Alya described.

"As hard as I tried, you couldn't recall a single thing about him! And he had left school by the time you returned, so you never got the chance to 'meet' him all over again... Adrien never got word of your little incident until _last night."_

A tad too tipsy to word it nicely, Alya set everything out for all to see.

_I'm sorry. Have we met before?_ Her parting words of the night before replayed in Marinette's head, each time weighing more heavily than the last. Accompanying the words was the image of Adrien's face as Alya had dragged him away. At the time, all Marinette had seen was confusion in his eyes, but the longer she thought about it, the more she recognized something else there, too. Pain.

Marinette was brought out of her trance by the sound of the fridge being noisily shut. Alya shrugged on her coat as she made her way back over to her friend.

"You might have forgotten him, but _I_ was the one capable of making you remember him. So don't go saying that everything's _your_ fault."

Setting down her offering on the table, Alya then turned for the door. "I'm going out for the night. Tell Nathanaël that I'm onboard with whatever he wanted to talk about."

With that, Marinette was alone to stare at the half-empty champagne bottle that Alya had left her.

* * *

Adrien refreshed his emails again for lack of a better thing to do.

"Come on, come on, come on," he chanted quietly, frosty puffs accenting each word.

_No New Mail._ The phrase appeared just the same as it had every other time. Adrien switched accounts and repeated the action only to receive similar results.

"AUGH!" The cry of exasperation was more of a muted whine, as Adrien knew he should be quiet while working. He also was supposed to be vigilant and focused. Frantically checking his email while on watch definitely went against that.

Adrien couldn't help it. He had something to possibly look forward to now. It was automatic that his every thought revolved around something so monumental. Well, not his _every_ thought. Because, buried somewhere beneath the swirling sea of excitement and anticipation at possibly getting an email from Nathanaël was a thought Adrien didn't want to think about.

_I'm sorry. Have we met before?_ The words surfaced again, cutting deep as he remembered the moment when everything going so right transformed to everything going so wrong.

He had been forgotten. How was he supposed to wrap his head around that? As far as Marinette was concerned, he'd been entirely wiped from existence—he'd never been a part of her life. But he _was_ a part of her life. Perhaps not a huge part, Adrien supposed, but he definitely was a part. Adrien had been around her for years. He had sat right in front of her desk. He had walked the same halls as her. He had played video games with her. He had worked together with her. Hell, even Chat Noir had worked together with her on occasion! This made some broken part of Adrien wonder if the remarkable Chat Noir stood a better chance of being memorable. The possibility stung, acting as insult to injury.

Adrien knew it was all in his head. Marinette couldn't control the damage done to her memories. There wasn't a reason he'd been singled out. It wasn't personal, it just happened. That didn't make him less hurt over it, though.

Everything felt so right with Marinette. Adrien had been so sure of himself talking to her. He felt like his old self. He felt lighter. Like none of the things that were weighing him down existed anymore. Adrien wanted it to stay that way.

But it couldn't. Marinette shouldn't have to be constantly reminded of her flawed memory by him being around. She was living a successful, flaw-free life right now, and who was he to selfishly impose on that?

Adrien let out a long sigh before returning to refreshing his email. It was a welcoming distraction that allowed him to again bury the thought that plagued the back of his mind. He needed to forget about being forgotten.

The club's side door opened, spilling noise and light into far end of the alley.

"Save a strawberry one for me! I'll be right b- _blergh!"_ The sound of vomit splattering across the ground was Adrien's cue to pocket his phone. Adrien spotted Raz's head peer around the corner to check the source of the sound, but returned to his post when the model motioned that he had it under control. He descended the stairs at a decent pace, and soon was at the puking girl's side.

"Let it out," Adrien said, as he routinely did, to announce his presence before gathering the young lady's hair and holding it out of harm's way. "You're fine, just let it out," he repeated calmly as he steadied the swaying girl by the shoulder. While his main part of the job was acting as additional security, at moments like this Adrien felt he was simply a mom taking care of his snotty, sick children. At least he didn't have to clean up after them.

After a minute, the girl eventually moved to right herself. Adrien released her hair, but as he watched the red tips slip through his fingers, he felt a crashing wave of familiarity.

"Sorry. Dunno what happened. I came out 'ere to get some fresh air and then—"

"Alya?" Adrien asked just as she turned around to face him. Wide brown eyes stared back at him, the colors of green from sickness and red from embarrassment draining away to leave Alya's face white.

"Great, now I'm seein' things," Alya mumbled aloud. "I need to go somewhere with fresher air."

"No, it's really me. It's Adrien," the blonde quickly corrected her train of thought. "What are you doing here? Is, uh, is Marinette with you?"

"Oh, no, no, no, no, no." Alya shook her head vigorously, forcing Adrien to again steady her with a hand as she began to sway. "I needed to get away from 'er before I fuck up anything else." She struggled with the sentence, her words choppy or running together in all the wrong places.

"You came here on your own?" Alya bobbed in agreement. "Okay," Adrien said, taking her by the elbow. In her state, no sober friend equaled a quick taxi home. "Let's take a walk up front."

Alya compliantly walked with Adrien until he stopped under the fluorescent entrance lights. Raz caught sight of them and walked over.

"Taxi?" Raz asked in his usual, taciturn manner.

Adrien was about to nod when he thought to check something first. "Alya, where should the taxi take you?"

"The hotel."

" _Which_ hotel?"

"The one we checked into yesterday," Alya answered confidently like it was a no-brainer. "The one tha' gives lil' complimen-mentary champagne bottles."

Adrien squeezed his eyes shut and ran a hand over his face. "No," he replied to Raz. "She doesn't know where she's staying."

"Oh, I know plenty!" Alya countered. "I know so much! Much more than you, Mr. Hero!"

Both Raz and Adrien dismissed the babbling as they conferred.

"I could look after her," Adrien offered, looking over at their apartment building. "We went to school together. I'll call a friend of hers to pick her up in the morning."

Raz raised an eyebrow. "Missy," he called for Alya's attention with a snap of his fingers. "You know this guy?"

"More than anyone else!" Alya puffed out her chest. Then the words just started flowing. "I could tell you his childhood address, his worst pickup lines, his high school crush, his secret iden—"

"A name will suffice," Raz cut her off.

"Yes," Alya answered, unfazed. "I know Adrien."

Adrien gave Raz a humored look. "See? Don't go doubting me now." He knew Raz was only checking because it was required, but he poked fun, nonetheless.

Raz shook his head and waved him off. "I'm two doors down if you need me." He turned away to go back inside the club to help with closing. "Don't need me."

* * *

Adrien got Alya back to his apartment with minimal struggle. If she had been wearing heels, that'd be an entirely different story. It helped that Alya was a fairly good walker while drunk. Her weakness appeared to only be her mouth.

"Woahhh," Alya called out at the entrance. "You live _here?_ "

"Yes," Adrien replied, not the best for humoring a drunk person's antics.

"But you're _you!"_

"Uh-huh. I'll explain it tomorrow, don't worry." Adrien plopped her down on the sofa. It was probably better for her here than the futon mattress on the floor. "How's a glass of water sound?"

"Mm, good!"

When he returned with the promised glass, Alya only stared at the offered drink.

"It's missing," she mumbled, staring at his hand.

Adrien looked down at the water. "No, it's clear. The water is there, trust me," he promised.

"No," Alya muttered again, a sad look on her face. "It's missing." She then reached out her hand, but instead of taking the glass, she placed her fingertips where Adrien once wore his ring. "It's gone."

Misunderstanding, Adrien opened Alya's hand and forced it to wrap around the glass. "It's fine, just drink," he said, helping to guide her hand to her mouth. When she'd successfully had a few swallows, Adrien presented her with her cell phone. "Marinette is staying with you in the hotel, right?" He received a gurgled yes. "Call her, and I'll leave a message so she knows where to get you in the morning."

Alya squinted intently at the screen while searching for the correct contact, and soon enough there was Marinette's name across the screen. Adrien felt his stomach clench in what could have anticipation, fear, excitement, or a combination of all three. So much for not being involved in Marinette's life... It would be a lie to say Adrien wasn't happy for having the excuse.

The ringing was brief, sending Adrien immediately to voicemail.

" _Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Leave a message."_ The pre-recorded voice came and went so quickly that Adrien was startled at the abrupt beep.

"Ah, it's Adrien. Adrien Agreste." After the words left his mouth, Adrien almost facepalmed. _Idiot. Like that means anything to her. She doesn't know you, remember?_ "Alya's friend."

That stung. _Wow_ , that stung. With that, it finally hit home that Adrien was no longer classified as Marinette's friend. At best, he was now known as a friend of a friend. Being a friend of a friend in Adrien's eyes was jack shit. A nobody... He was now a nobody.

"I ran into Alya, and she couldn't remember which hotel you guys were staying in. She's fine, I'm just letting her sleep it off at my place. So, um, you can come pick her up in the morning. I'll be here all day, so there's no rush." Adrien spaced out a moment at the thought of seeing Marinette tomorrow morning. He then quickly realized he was still being recorded, and flusteredly added, "Right, uh, goodnight!"

Hanging up, Adrien held the phone in his hand. He stared at the contact name for a while before the spell was broken by Alya suddenly snorting.

"Ha!" Alya sleepily cried. "You forgot to tell her your address to pick me up at! Ha ha! You had one job!"

Adrien's cheeks burned at the realization. He didn't give her a location. That was all he set out to do, and he'd forgotten to do it.

"Fuck," Adrien quietly cursed himself as Alya continued to laugh.

"This side of you is just as big of a dork as she described you to be!" Alya exclaimed, tears now escaping her. The exclamation was missed on Adrien who was too busy drowning in embarrassment as he sent an additional text containing his address to the same number.

The blonde then retreated to the kitchen, in search of getting his own glass of water. Downing the cooling liquid, Adrien felt it clash with the burn that had now reached his ears. It was all he could do to hope that his face wouldn't still be cherry tomato red by the time Marinette showed up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gears are in motion, I repeat, gears are in motion! Things are looking up for our little cinnamon roll! For everyone that's sat through Adrien's suffering, your patience is about to pay off. The drama only escalates, and get this, the next chapter is gonna be CUTE... Crazy, right?!


	10. New Beginnings

Chapter 10: New Beginnings

Adrien didn't sleep.

Correction: Adrien didn't sleep all night. Only when morning hit and the blonde had already accepted the fact that he wasn't sleeping a wink did he nod off. Quite literally.

Before it came to that, Adrien tried everything. He paced. He refreshed his emails. He stargazed. He cleaned out and reorganized his fridge. He counted the number of cracks in the ceiling. He tried to tire himself out by doing his morning workout routine early. A shower was then mandatory, but not even the blanketing warmth of the water could bring him closer to dozing off.

So there Adrien sat, accepting failure as he stared down the sun peaking over the horizon. A loud snore interrupted his reluctant surrender, and his gaze turned to look over at the tangled mess of blankets and hair that he knew to be Alya.

"Okay, now you're just rubbing it in," Adrien muttered bitterly as he poured himself a bowl of cereal and went to grab the milk. As though to prove him right, Alya's snoring intensified. Adrien pressed his forehead against the fridge and gave a growl of frustration before clearing his mind.

"Focus," Adrien commanded himself, sitting back down on the kitchen stool. He consulted the clock as he poured milk into the bowl. _6:30_ it read. Likely at least another hour or two until Marinette showed up. "Breakfast. Get dressed. Wake up Alya. Figure out what you're going to say. Don't make a fool of yourself when she gets here." He repeated the to-do list as he grabbed a spoon, setting out to accomplish the first task.

After his drawn out struggle, all it took was the milk hitting his lips while bathing in the morning rays of the sun, and Adrien's inner feline was out like a light.

* * *

_Knock, knock, knock._

Sputtering milk, Adrien jolted awake. "Present!" He cried out, having just been ripped from a dream where someone was taking attendance. As a milk-soaked clump of Cheerios fell from his face, Adrien learned that he was not in fact in a classroom. No, as per his usual luck, Adrien found himself seated at his kitchen counter, wearing his breakfast as a facemask as a result of conking out directly into the bowl in front of him.

"Oh, _come on!"_ Adrien groaned aloud. With dread, Adrien looked over to the clock, knowing things could only get worse. _9:02_. "Fuck me sideways," Adrien sleepily muttered at the glowing red numbers. Two and a half hours, straight out the window. "Goddammit." The curse was muffled as Adrien toweled off his face. Once it was breakfast free, Adrien put his head in his hands. Great. He still had a whole list of things to do before Marinette arrived.

_Knock, knock, knock._

Adrien shot upright at the sound. His fuzzy mind hadn't registered the initial series of knocks that woke him up, but he sure as hell understood the knocking now. Marinette was already here, at the door, waiting.

"Coming! One second!" Adrien called out, practically flying out of his seat.

True to his word, the door swung open a second later.

The moment he set eyes on her, he didn't know what to do with himself. She was the definition of stunning, freezing Adrien on the spot. Despite the unforgiving nature of it being a Monday morning, Marinette appeared unaffected. She looked almost purposefully windswept by the early November air, and Adrien felt a chill run down his spine upon looking into her icy blue eyes, as if feeling a similar breeze.

"I, uh," Adrien's jaw worked jerkily, like it was mechanical and hadn't been oiled in far too long. "I'm, er, oh god. Hi." He eventually managed the greeting. "Good morning."

_Nice, Adrien. Perfect time to have a mental seizure and verbally vomit._ Adrien wanted to slap himself.

Marinette observed the blonde as he stood in the doorway and couldn't help but crack a grin. The designer hadn't known what to expect in coming here, but this was quite the pleasant surprise. She'd only known the model's media persona—a dedicated, intelligent, charismatic idol with godlike features that never failed to make girls swoon. While accurate, Marinette could tell from just these two encounters that the description hardly scratched the surface at summing up the boy before her.

He was clearly out of his element, that much she knew. Then again, she wouldn't have expected otherwise. First it was meeting up with a friend after not seeing each other for seven years, and now it was meeting a person who had completely forgotten his existence. Who _wouldn't_ act strange under those circumstances? Adrien was likely the kind of person to relax and become comfortable over time.

_Well, we'll sure have plenty of that,_ Marinette thought to herself. Her all-knowing smile grew larger. _I'm looking forward to it._

"Morning," Marinette greeted back. A soft chuckle escaped her as she drunk in his appearance once more before reaching out to him. Adrien's eyes widened as he felt agile fingers pluck something from his hair. Marinette held up the Cheerio for him to see before adding, "By the looks of it, you don't seem to be having a very good one."

Color rose to Adrien's cheeks as he ran his hand up through his hair to check if any more cereal was hiding there. "Heh, I wonder how you could tell," Adrien weakly joked.

"Lucky guess," Marinette answered, a sly glint in her eye. "Though I must say you wear breakfast well. The rest of your outfit, too. Not quite something that I'd design, perhaps, but you certainly make it look good."

"The rest of my outfit?" Adrien echoed before finally taking a full look at his current state.

_Get dressed._ The second part of his abandoned to-do list hit Adrien like a truck. _You didn't get dressed._ Adrien turned several shades of red brighter. Pajama pants and a bathrobe. All he was wearing was pajama pants and a bathrobe.

A pause followed where Adrien just stared, open mouthed, at his state of undress. Then, not missing a beat, Adrien looked up at Marinette, who simply offered him a warm smile.

"I don't suppose you could forget this whole thing ever happened and let me start over?" Adrien asked almost casually, like he wasn't currently hoping for the ground to swallow him up.

Marinette quirked an eyebrow and hummed, pretending to consider his proposition. "I do have a skill for forgetting things," she mused. "I'll give it a shot."

_And a sense of humor, too? Okay, that's it. I'm done for._

Adrien shut out the voice in the back of his head and held up a finger. "Be back in one minute," he promised, rushing to then close the door.

Marinette couldn't resist a small laugh when she heard scuffling on the other side of the door. The seconds ticked by, and Marinette turned to contemplate the Cheerio in her hand. _Oh yeah,_ Marinette thought happily. _Definitely looking forward to getting to know Adrien Agreste._ With that, she popped the Cheerio in her mouth right as the door swung open for a second time.

"Hi," said a now properly, and quite tastefully dressed Adrien. Marinette noted he seemed to have also washed his face and combed through his hair several times with his fingers. "I'm going to pretend like I didn't just answer the door covered with food and half dressed in pajamas. How was your weekend?" Adrien delivered seamlessly.

Marinette responded in like. "And I'm going to pretend like I didn't forget an old friend and unknowingly break the news to him in the worst way possible at a reunion party." She accompanied the sentiment with a sincere look before tacking on, "My weekend was a little rough, but I ended up running into somebody who's pretty great. So, overall, not bad!"

All Adrien could do was smile. "Same," he said. Neither spoke for a minute, instead simply looking at the other. Finally, Adrien asked, "Could I get you some coffee?"

"I'd love some. Extra sweet."

"Done," Adrien breathed as he stepped out of the doorway to let Marinette inside.

* * *

Marinette wrapped her fingers around the warm cup, inhaling the steam coming off the dark liquid. The soft hum of a shower running permeated the room, creating a relaxing atmosphere. As Adrien was preparing his own cup, Marinette looked around at the small, beaten down apartment. It was surprising to say the least that she'd find a high-end model like Adrien living in such a place. She liked it. There was a certain charm to finding someone like him someplace like here. Smiling to herself, Marinette took a sip. Just like the apartment, the coffee was far from anything fancy. Likely some cheap store brand. But it warmed her just the same.

Adrien was halfway through pouring cream into his cup when his phone buzzed. Immediately abandoning his coffee, the model went to check his device. His shoulders slumped after a moment, clearly not seeing what he wanted to see on the screen.

"Expecting something?" Marinette asked.

Adrien looked up, embarrassed at being caught paying more attention to his phone than his guest. "Uh, yeah. An email."

"Important one?"

"I sure hope so." Adrien gave a tense sigh.

Marinette tilted her head in her hand, seemingly finding Adrien's worrying to be endearing. It was cute that he cared so deeply. "I'm sure you'll get it soon," she assured. "It's still early. Some of the people I know don't even check their email until now." Giving the clock a glance, she pretended to note the time before having some fun. "I'll bet your email comes in at nine-thirty."

Adrien's eyebrows rose questioningly. "You seem oddly confident about that."

Marinette simply shrugged. "Like I said, I'm a lucky guesser."

Adrien didn't get a chance to respond, the bathroom door choosing to fly open at that exact moment. Out burst Alya in a cloud of steam, cleansed of the sweat and grime that she'd worn the previous night. She was dressed in professional attire, courtesy of Marinette thinking ahead to bring her a new outfit.

"Okay! Ready to go!" Alya called out as she rushed around to gather her items that were strewn across the room. "We're already late to work, let's move!" Her chipperness was unexpected to Adrien. He'd been expecting her to be sporting quite the vicious hangover this morning, but she looked to be quite the opposite.

"Oh, trust me, I know," Marinette said with a roll of her eyes. "You're talking to the person who actually _started working_ before seeing that you drunkenly called not my personal phone, but my _work_ phone to leave a message."

"The words and numbers blurred together, and they looked the same!" Alya said defensively, sporting a playful pout.

This was the wonderful thing about Marinette and Alya's relationship. The tension of their conversation the previous day was gone, as though it was never there to begin with, and was replaced with their usual friendly, carefree, joking dynamic. After all that they'd been through, the bond forged between them was too strong to ever be damaged.

"Oh! Oh! Before I forget, you gotta catch me up on last night's meeting," Alya said as she hurriedly threw on a coat.

"You sure missed a good one." Marinette"s voice had a teasing tone as her gaze slid briefly to where Adrien stood. "I'll tell you on the way to the car." She tipped back the rest of the warm drink before standing up to leave.

Adrien was suddenly bombarded as Alya swooped in to give him an overdue hug. "Thanks for everything! I know I must have been horrible, but thank you so, _so_ much for taking care of me!"

A warmth spread through Adrien as he finally reacted, wrapping his arms around the over-the-top brunette. It suddenly occurred to him that he hadn't been hugged in a long time. And the last time he'd been hugged by a friend was... Well, he couldn't even remember when that was.

"It was nothing. I'd do anything for a friend." It felt so good being able to say that.

Alya's eyes shone brightly as she returned his smile. Adrien walked the girl over to the door, Marinette waiting patiently beside it.

"It was good meeting you, Adrien." Marinette looked at the blonde with eyes that he could've sworn saw straight into his soul. She extended her hand. "As awful as it sounds, I'm kind of glad you got stuck taking care of my hopelessly drunk friend."

"Me, too," Adrien said, shaking her hand. There was a certain contentment in his voice.

"Ay! I'm right here!"

Marinette tuned out Alya's distressed cry, still focused on Adrien. "Again, thank you."

She'd only finished thanking him when Adrien's phone buzzed loudly from his pocket. A look over Adrien's shoulder confirmed her earlier suspicion. _9:30._ Nathanaël was as punctual as ever. The model moved to fish the phone out of his pocket at the same time Marinette opened the door.

"I'll see you tomorrow." Marinette and Alya each gave a wave farewell, making their exit.

"Goodbye!" Adrien managed distractedly before the door closed. Now alone again in his empty apartment, he just stood there, basking in the glow that Marinette had left behind. When he eventually came back to himself, Adrien checked the new notification lighting up his phone.

_1 New Email._

He looked at the time stamp next to the words. _9:30._

"How did she—?" Adrien began out loud before trailing off, the last part of Marinette's goodbye finally catching up with him. "See you tomorrow?"

* * *

"NO WAY!"

"Yes way," Marinette repeated for the third time. Alya became increasingly hysterical.

"You hired ADRIEN fucking AGRESTE?!"

"Well, technically Nathanaël did. He pitched the idea, all I did was approve it."

Alya began beating her feet on the ground, shaking the car like crazy. Reaching over, she shook Marinette by her shoulders. "This is just too amazing! We're all going to be working together!"

Marinette escaped her hold and put the car in gear, but paused a moment to look back at the apartment complex in her sideview mirror. Adrien's face in mind, Marinette gave an eager grin.

"Yeah," she said, the excitement she felt somehow seeming familiar. "I have a feeling we'll make quite the team."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Definitely my favorite chapter to write so far. So, there ya go, folks! Our favorite team will be reunited, and they haven't the slightest clue! All thanks to Alya and Nathanaël pulling some strings behind the scenes, our favorite designer and model are a duo once more and are ready to take the fashion world by storm... What will happen along the way?


	11. Old Faces, New Places

Chapter 11: Old Faces, New Places

Adrien felt the intense need to pinch himself. It was only for the sake of professionalism that he didn't. As a result, Adrien sat in the meeting room, clueless as to whether or not he was currently in a dream—a dream in which all of his old classmates somehow _worked together_.

A half hour before, he'd been in a similar state.

* * *

" _Can I help direct you, sir?" The kind woman at the lobby front desk came as a saving grace to the boy feeling like a fish out of water._

" _Yes, I'm looking for Nathanaël Bronn?"_

" _With DCD?"_

_The notion was still mind blowing to Adrien. "That's the one."_

_Her meticulously manicured fingers moved from their poised station over her keyboard to instead grab a pen and a sticky note._

" _DCD spans Floor 18 to 20." Her pen scribbled along with her words. "Their main office is on 20, so you should be able to ask for him there."_

_Thanking her, Adrien caught the next elevator and inevitably fidgeted the whole ride. When he stepped out, there was no question as to how he'd find Nathanaël. No, Nathanaël found him._

" _Adrien!" Nathanaël called out, pushing away from the secretary's desk where he'd been chatting. "Good, you found the place okay."_

" _Can't really miss it," Adrien said in return. "Speaking of missing things, did I somehow miss you telling me that you work for Dupain-Cheng Design of all things? That you're working with Marinette?"_

_Nathanaël smiled sheepishly. "Sorry, guess I was kind of scatter-brained. I get like that when I'm excited."_

" _Can't blame you." Another voice wove its way into their conversation. Adrien recognized it immediately. Her voice simply demanded his attention. "I would've fallen all over myself to sign him, too." Marinette came strolling up, arms loosely crossed, an amused smile on her lips at Adrien's obvious disbelief of his current situation._

" _Long time, no see," Marinette said, mirth in her eyes._

" _No kidding."_

_Giving a light chuckle, she added, "Well, welcome to DCD. We're happy to have you."_

" _I'd say I'm happy to be here, but I don't think that quite does it justice."_

_She gave him an appraising look and locked onto a peculiarity. "Two thermoses?" Sharp as ever, she'd spotted an additional coffee thermos to the one he held in his hand lodged in the side pocket of his bag. Nothing escaped this girl. "Like coffee much?"_

" _No. Well,_ yes _, but no." There he went stumbling over his words again. Before it got any worse, he pushed forward. "It's, uh, for you."_

" _For me?"_

_Adrien reached back to grab the container nestled away in his bag. "I was thinking about how I was going to end up seeing you at work, and I kinda made it without realizing what I was doing. I normally just add cream, but I somehow started pouring sugar." Giving a hopeless wave of his hands, Adrien attempted to dismiss his mixup. "And I'm not one to waste perfectly good coffee, so, uh, it's yours if you want it."_

_A curious eyebrow rose at his explanation. Extending her own hand to meet his, Marinette accepted the offered drink. Without pause, she took a testing sip._

" _Extra sweet," she commented, a content hum following the liquid passing her lips. "You remembered."_

_Adrien fought color from rising to his cheeks. Marinette's mouth curved upwards at the shrug he gave. Weaving her fingers comfortably around the mug, Marinette's attention shifted to Nathanaël._

" _Nathanaël, could you get Adrien all set up in 20-A1. I need a minute to go down and grab the paperwork."_

_Coming to life, Nathanaël immediately reached for Adrien's shoulder to guide him. "Yeah, sure thing. I'll pick up the concept journal along the way."_

_Marinette watched as Nathanaël steered him away and took another quick, sweet sip. Turning to the elevator, she was brought up short when faced with a grinning Alya, who had somehow snuck up on her during the whole exchange._

" _Well, I'd say welcoming the new hire went swimmingly!" Alya all but sang._

" _I got free coffee out of it. How does it get any better than that?" Marinette joked smoothly as they both stepped into the elevator. A light blinked to life as she pressed the desired floor. From the corner of her eye, Marinette could see Alya rocking back and forth on her feet, a cheeky smile consuming her features. "Okay, out with it. You look about ready to burst. What are you so excited about?"_

_Alya's motion stopped, leaving her perched on her toes. Grin widening, she replied innocently, "Oh, nothing. Nothing at all!"_

_Marinette rolled her eyes. "Come on, I know that look. Either A, there's chocolate filled doughnuts in the break room, or B, you're fangirling over something."_

" _It's nothing, I swear!"_

_Giving her friend a very unconvinced look, the designer walked out once the metal doors opened. Alya followed out after her, a little something extra in her step that brought her dangerously close to skipping. Oh, she was fangirling alright. Because last night, while reflecting on the series of crazy events that had brought Adrien and Marinette together and how her meddling was finally paying off, Alya had realized something._

_Adrien didn't need to call Marinette that night._

_Alya would've remembered the name of the hotel after sleeping it off. In the morning, she could've just called a taxi to get back. And it was this thought that made her theorize about why Adrien immediately leapt to calling Marinette._

_He didn't_ need _to call her. He_ wanted _to._

* * *

"Adrien?... Adrien did we lose you?"

The blonde snapped to attention. Right, the meeting room. Acting professional. Not freaking out over the fact that all of his old friends now worked together.

"Oh gosh, I'm so sorry!" Adrien quickly apologized. "My head just got away from me. I still can't really believe I'm here, I guess."

Alya gave an understanding smile before stretching out to grab his hand. Squeezing it supportively, Alya shook her head. "You're fine, don't worry about it!"

"I'm not an amateur, I swear," Adrien weakly laughed, sheepishly carding fingers through his hair.

"We know," Marinette said. "I'm familiar with your work. I was sold the second Nathanaël threw out your name. Even more so when he said you were now an independent."

"Wait, what?" That sent the model for a loop. Being labeled an independent was the worst thing he had going for him right now. "You _wanted_ an independent?"

Marinette shrugged. "Let's just say that I'm not a fan of big agencies. The last one we worked with tried to trick us by charging us for twice the amount of models we hired. Alya caught them before they cornered us, thankfully. I've insisted on hiring on an individual basis since then. As a smaller company, it's safer. And while it might be more expensive," the designer locked eyes with him, "I'm more satisfied with the results."

Wordlessly, Adrien nodded.

Smiling, Alya explained, "I'm sure it won't take you long to learn that we're kinda unconventional here."

"You're perfect for the face of the campaign," Nathanaël added, back on topic. "We have already gathered a good amount of models, but we were waiting for someone just right to project our concept to the public."

"You wanted to talk more about concepts today, right?" Alya asked Nathanaël, readying a notepad for the jotting of any ideas.

"Yeah, I was hoping to add a new addition." Nathanaël swiveled in his chair to face Adrien. "Okay, so with this line DCD is aiming to Stand the Test of Time. We wanted to tell a story, showcasing different looks carrying you through a stage of your life. The goal is to be simple, understandable, and relatable enough to appeal to a large audience." As he explained, Nathanaël spread sketches across the table for them to see. Adrien identified his role with ease, but alongside the sketched version of himself, he spotted a recurring figure. "I know we had only originally planned for a single face of the campaign," Nathanaël continued, "But I was thinking the most effective way to tell the story is with a couple."

Shuffling the pictures around, Marinette slowly nodded. "I like it. It gives a good sense of balance." She then paused, a finger hovering over the figure of the female lead. "She's detailed the same way in each shot. Quite specifically." Pointing between each picture backed her words. "Did you already have someone in mind?"

Nathanaël lit up, pleased at his next proposal being found out so intuitively. "Well, actually, I did. I have yet to properly ask, but she should be on her way up any secon—"

A quick knock followed up by the door swinging open finished Nathanaël's sentence for him. The door almost fell shut again if it weren't for a flawlessly polished shoe diving in at the last second to keep it ajar. The wearer had no free hands, too occupied with juggling the pastry box and her briefcase, so she instead shouldered her way into the room.

"Sorry I took so long. I saw the chocolate filled doughnuts in the break room and thought I should grab a box for Alya. Did I miss anything important?"

A single blonde hair fell out of place as she came into view, but she flicked it back automatically, acting as though the hair was never anywhere except where it was supposed to be.

"No, your timing's perfect," Nathanaël stood, moving to take the box and pass it across to a salivating Alya. "We were just talking about you."

Adrien sat utterly slack-jawed.

Standing in the doorway was none other than Chloe Bourgeois.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What a small, small world! Chloe's come out to play... How do you think this game changer will affect our lovely duo?


	12. Second Chances - Part I

Chapter 12: Second Chances - Part I

Chloe's first day of public school was just like every other kid's. She was a mess of nerves and had worst-case scenarios running left and right through her head. Her worries stemmed from the inevitable fears that nobody would like her, that she'd trip and make a fool of herself in front of the whole class, or that she'd end up sitting alone at lunch. All the typical stuff.

Her driver had dropped her off twenty minutes ago. Mixed excitement and anxiety had made her ask to be dropped off a half hour early. She didn't know what to do with the extra time once she arrived, so Chloe chose to sit alone on a bench outside. It was cold; winter had decided to come early. The tremors caused by the chilly air didn't help calm her down.

"Everyone probably already has friends," Chloe mumbled to herself. She felt tempted to kick the rock right next to her foot, but she didn't want to risk scuffing her shoe. It took three solid hours for her to pick this outfit out last night, and she wasn't about to let that go to waste. Instead, Chloe settled for checking her reflection in her compact again.

First impressions were everything. Well, that was what Chloe had read, anyway. Yes, she researched how to make friends at school. Okay, so a good amount of "research" consisted of watching teen dramas, but it was something!

Locking eyes with her reflection, Chloe sat straighter. "You're a Bourgeois. Of course they'll like you. Who wouldn't?" The words brought confidence.

Her name had always carried her through life. Money, Power, and Influence—that's what it represented. And as far as Chloe knew, that was all anyone could ever need or want. She'd lived quite the sheltered life, and never being properly told what was right, what was wrong, or how to act left her insanely out of touch with the reality. Attending public school would be her first real world experience, and Chloe thought it'd be little to no different than her life up to this point. Blissfully naive, she didn't realize the way her upbringing had twisted her mind.

"Just act normal."

Only years later would Chloe reflect, finally capable of recognizing all the things she unknowingly did wrong by trying to follow that one piece of advice.

It was there, Chloe sitting all alone on that bench, that Marinette first saw her. The fated hero stood in the mouth of the entrance hallway, peering out at the girl seemingly giving herself a pep talk.

_She must be new!_ Marinette gleefully thought to herself. _She seems nervous. I should welcome her. I need to make friends somehow, after all!_

Marinette darted out of sight as the blonde stood and confidently flipped her hair. She waited patiently as she heard the measured clicks of shoes on pavement, ready to greet the new student. What Marinette wasn't prepared for was Chloe strongly rounding the corner to crash right into her.

Books flew, and Marinette fell to the ground with them. "Oh my gosh!" Marinette immediately cried. "I'm so sorry, are you alr—"

"What have you done?!" Chloe cried out almost reflexively. She felt her hands trembling in humiliation. One step into the building and something had already gone wrong. This wasn't right! Things were supposed to go her way! "You've ruined everything!"

Marinette, in the process of collecting the fallen textbooks, felt a verbal slap across the face at Chloe's condescending tone. "I said I was sorry, I didn't meant to—"

"What? You didn't mean to break the strap on my newest Louis Vuitton handbag? _Oh_ , well I guess if you didn't _mean to_ , then everything's just wonderful!" Scorching words surged to cover up the fact that Chloe was shaking. Perhaps, to the attracted bystanders it appeared like Chloe was shaking in anger, but the reality was that her fears had come to life. Feeling the eyes of the student body burning into her with judgement instead of the usual admiration, Chloe was near crippled with panic. At times like this, falling back on her identity was all she knew.

Chloe held out the strap in question, the fine material having yielded when snagged by a falling book. Marinette's eyes widened as she automatically offered, "I could fix it, or if you want me to pay for it, I could—"

"Do you even know how much this cost?" Chloe snapped disdainfully.

"One thousand, five hundred and ninety."

Marinette's mouth had been open, but she hadn't been the one to guess the large figure. A girl parted the surrounding crowd, coming to stand by Chloe's side. Her orange bob swished as she carefully took the bag from the stunned blonde.

"The new Santa Monica Clutch, right?" the girl asked after having considered the accessory up close.

"Y-Yes," Chloe breathed. "At least somebody here knows what I'm talking about."

With a fine adjustment of her glasses, the orange-haired girl turned to give Marinette a belittling look. "Sadly, I'm probably the only one. You're wasting your time on her if you think she'd understand." Looking back to the damaged clutch, she then said, "Come on, let's see what we can do about this."

Chloe, as if in a daze, followed in Sabrina's tracks after thanklessly snatching the books that Marinette had collected. Marinette was left crouching on the floor, staring after them. _Well, that wasn't quite the welcome I had in mind._ Picking herself up and brushing off dirt, she looked at their retreating figures. _Just dealing with one would've been bad enough, but both of them together? They're a recipe for disaster._

"You could buy another strap separately," Sabrina offered as she unclasped the broken strap pieces. Once the offending blemish was removed, she considered the clutch. "I mean, it still looks remarkable even without the strap. Keeping it strapless is always an option."

Chloe was practically glowing as she watched Sabrina work. This was it. This was exactly the kind of friend she'd been hoping for. Sabrina was exactly like every other person Chloe had surrounded herself—someone who recognized the better things in life and came to her aid at the drop of a hat.

"I'll just buy a newer bag," Chloe said, no longer caring about the clutch. "It's not a big deal."

"Wow, really?" Sabrina's face was suddenly alive. "Your parents don't mind?"

"My dad's fine with getting me whatever I want," Chloe explained without a thought. Only then did it occur to her that she hadn't introduced herself. "I'm Chloe Bourgeois, by the way."

"Bourgeois?" Sabrina echoed, eyes lighting up in recognition. "I'm Sabrina," she offered eagerly in response.

_Make Sabrina your friend, Chloe, come on! She's right there! Do something to seal the deal!_ Chloe internally screamed.

Without thinking, Chloe gestured at the clutch. "You can have it if you want. Think of it as a gift for, uh, all of your help."

Money and material items. The currency in which Chloe had come to measure affection. Sadly, it was also a currency that Sabrina was familiar with.

"Seriously?" Sabrina was awestruck, clutching the bag closer to her chest, melting under receiving Chloe's attention.

"Yeah, what are friends for?"

Both Sabrina and Chloe alike had a warped idea of friendship. In the presence of each other, the twisted nature of it all only magnified. Chloe had always been held on a pedestal, and having Sabrina around to hang on her every word and entertain her every whim with blinding loyalty kept the heiress oblivious to the fact that friendship wasn't meant to work that way. Sabrina found purpose in trying to impress Chloe, always happy to do whatever unpleasant task to get her attention, making her the perfect candidate to fluff Chloe's ego and continue the vicious cycle.

They had a symbiotic relationship of unwitting, mutual self-destruction. Just as Marinette had predicted, they were a disaster waiting to happen.

Disaster struck mid-freshman year.

* * *

Chloe riffled through her backpack, trying and failing to remain composed. _Where is it?! Sabrina always puts my homework in this folder. Did she mix up folders? I swear, I've looked through everything!_

"Pass your assignments forward." The sound of frantic paper shuffling intensified, drawing the teacher's attention. " _Now_ , if you please."

Chloe channeled her inner teacher's pet as she looked up with a measured, apologetic and embarrassed smile. "I seem to have misplaced mine. Could I drop it off later when I find it?" Batting her lashes had no effect on her professor's stoney attitude.

"Late assignments are zeroes, Ms. Bourgeois. That's been the policy, and it will continue to be the policy. No exceptions," Mr. Durand responded coolly.

"Don't worry about it." A smooth, feminine voice at Chloe's ear made her jump. It was the girl who sat behind her, leaning forward to pass up the stack of papers from their row. "If it's just the one assignment, you should be fine, right?"

Numbly, Chloe read over the topmost paper. It was in Sabrina's handwriting; she'd know that penmanship anywhere. But, scrawled elegantly where Chloe's name would normally reside, there was a written challenge: _Charlotte,_ it read.

Shifting, Chloe turned to see the face attached to the name and was met with a smug, confident grin. "Should be no problem, right, Chloe?" Charlotte repeated, the underlying threat spoken so innocently that Chloe felt almost _obligated_ to second-guess herself.

"Yeah," Chloe answered almost robotically, eyes narrowing as dread set in. "No problem at all."

* * *

"What the hell, Sabrina! What was _that?"_

"I was helping out a friend."

"Since when is Charlotte your _friend?_ We barely talk to her. She's not your friend, _I'm_ your friend!" Chloe slammed her locker, the sound echoing through the empty corridor. School had been let out an hour ago, but Chloe had stuck around for clubs to end.

"Are you?" Sabrina countered.

_"What?"_

"Are you really my friend?" Sabrina didn't waver. "Because I've only known Charlotte a short while, and I can already say that she's treated me better than you ever did." She crossed her arms firmly, the fine chain of a handbag hanging on her wrist. It was new. Sabrina had described wanting something like this last weekend, but Chloe had yet to buy her one.

"What are you talking about?" Chloe sputtered. "I'm a great friend. Where is this even coming from?"

"Have you ever thanked me? Even _once_?" Sabrina spat out, causing Chloe to freeze in surprise. "You _never_ appreciate what I do for you, Chloe. You never appreciate _me_."

"That's not true!"

Sabrina raised an eyebrow, wordlessly asking Chloe to name a single time the words "thank you" had passed her lips.

"I-But you just do things! I've only come to expect things because you do them automatically! You like the way things are! We're a team, this is how we work!" She tried to dodge both the question and blame.

"Some team! I'm just some sidekick to you, aren't I?"

"No! You're my friend!"

"Well, you've sure got a funny way of showing it."

"I-I'm..." Words failed her. This kind of thing was never her strong suit. Whenever Chloe needed to say something, buying a present did the trick just as well, if not better. "I don't understand. I don't know what's—I don't get how you're... What do you want me to say?... I'm sorr—"

"Sorry to keep you waiting!" Charlotte abruptly sprung out from a connecting hallway, similar to how a snake in the grass would launch itself at unsuspecting prey. Jogging up to Sabrina, the track star slung an arm around her shoulders. The gesture was pointedly possessive. "Thanks for hanging back," she added. Chloe didn't think it was her imagination that unneeded emphasis was placed on a specific word.

Sabrina's eyes shone as she looked up at her new Queen Bee. "Oh, it was nothing!"

_That's how she used to look at me._

Keeping the emotions at bay, Chloe swallowed hard and pierced Charlotte with her eyes. "Could I talk with you for a minute?" Her tone left no room to weasel out of confrontation.

Charlotte held her gaze, simply squeezing Sabrina's shoulder. "Sure. Sabrina, could you go start the car to get the A/C running? I'll be right out." Sabrina took the keys and ran off with a light in her eyes, as though she'd been entrusted with some grand task. The moment the orange-haired girl was out of earshot, Charlotte's mask fell, and she turned to Chloe with a haughty smirk. "Chloe Bourgeois seeks an audience with me? What an honor. How could I possibly be of service?"

"You could start with leaving Sabrina the fuck alone." Chloe was done dancing around, getting straight to the point.

"Oh," Charlotte clicked her tongue and faked a burdened shake of the head. "That I can't do, sorry."

"And why's that?"

"Well, you see, I don't _want_ to."

"So, what? You want to rip us apart by painting me as the bad guy and sweeping Sabrina up for yourself? That's your goal? That's disgusting. You're _manipulating_ her."

"And?"

Stunned, Chloe had to forcefully shake herself. The look of complete uncaringness on Charlotte's face as she acknowledged the accusation sent Chloe's skin crawling. "And you think I'm just going to _let_ you do that to my best friend?"

"God, take a look in the mirror, sweetheart!" Charlotte laughed. "Like you're any better! Best friend? _Really?_ That girl is your puppet. You've manipulated her just as much as I have. Do you seriously think I got her to turn on you without any truth to what I was saying? All I had to do was point out you pulling her strings and hide the fact that I planned to take your place. Poor girl is too easy to trick, it's almost unfair."

"How-How _dare_ you!" Chloe's voice shook as she opened and closed her hand, the urge to slap Charlotte temptingly strong. "We've been friends for years! I would _never_ do that to Sabrina."

"I doubt you even know what true friendship is." Charlotte flipped her hair passively before turning to follow where Sabrina had gone, no longer interested. "I might manipulate people into thinking we're friends, but at least I can tell the difference between what's fake and what's real. But hey, if it's what helps you sleep at night, then by all means keep pretending. But I'm sure even you realize it on some level." Shooting a grin over her shoulder, Charlotte dealt what she knew would be the deathblow: "You're just as bad as I am."

* * *

"Adrien, am I a bad friend?"

"No, why are you—"

"Can you give me an honest answer? Uh, please?"

Adrien sat upright, the homework he'd been hunched over entirely forgotten. There it was again. Chloe was acting strange. First it was her coming over to do math homework with him. Normally, she always went to Sabrina's to "do homework", which was really her filing her nails and reading magazines while Sabrina did all the actual work. Yet, here Chloe was, awkwardly sitting on Adrien's bedroom floor with _Advanced Trigonometry_ cracked open and a confused, but very much engaged look on her face. Now, there were these strange questions.

Chloe misread his pause, thinking she hadn't been clear enough. "I just... I don't want you to give me the answer you think I want to hear. I'm starting to think that those are the only kind of answers I get anymore. But I trust you, and I hope you'll give me an honest answer if I ask for one... Please."

_Woah, okay._ Signals starting going off like crazy in Adrien's head. _Chloe hasn't been like this in years. I knew something was off._

"Where is this coming from?" Adrien shifted to give her his full attention. Chloe responded with a shrug. He saw the motion as not her saying she didn't know, but that she was reluctant to talk about it. Adrien sat patiently, allowing for a minute to pass, not rushing her until she was ready to open up.

"While you were away, Sabrina and I kind of... Split up?" Her voice broke. Stating the event like it was fact hurt too much, so she instead made a question of it.

Adrien scooted closer. "What happened?"

Another shrug. "She was talking with some girl, Charlotte. She got it in her head that I didn't care about her as a friend and only kept her around because she did whatever I wanted. Charlotte convinced her that I was manipulating her, and now Sabrina is Charlotte's little minion, but Sabrina doesn't see anything wrong with it because Charlotte acts like she cares way more than I did." Chloe was anxiously twisting a strand of her hair, a habit that Adrien thought she'd ditched in her early tween years. The nervous twitch was something associated with weakness, but when she'd weaned herself off, Chloe had used the excuse that it was because she didn't want to damage her golden locks, not that she didn't want to appear vulnerable.

Adrien, as he always had in their childhood, eased Chloe's hand out of her hair and replaced it with his own. His fingers combed through it gently, smoothing and separating before beginning to weave pieces into a braided design. It was a soothing gesture, similar to something a mother would do with care before sending a child off for school. He felt Chloe melt into the touch, reassured that she was in a safe place. Adrien hummed, showing he was listening and prompting her to continue.

"I could get her back... I know I could. I could make her see how awful Charlotte is and have Sabrina come running back to me. But that would just prove Charlotte right! I would have to outmanipulate her to get Sabrina back, and that means that I control Sabrina through manipulation." Chloe choked as she tried to hold back an unexpected sob. "I've been watching them all week—it's _awful_. Charlotte treats her like a doormat to walk all over, and Sabrina is _happy_ about it because she thinks that's how 'friends' are supposed to be. And I look at them and think, 'How were we any different?'" Adrien took the silence that followed her question as her saying she couldn't figure out the answer. "Then I think about what Sabrina said... And I wonder if they're both right?"

Chloe tilted her head up to look at Adrien. "Am I a bad friend? Do I even know how to be a good friend?"

Adrien blinked in surprise. All this time he was gone, Chloe had been silently struggling with something this heavy? He continued to carefully braid her hair. "Honestly?"

"Honestly." Chloe blinked away the moisture in her eyes, steeling herself for what was to come.

Adrien paused in his work to think. "You aren't a bad _person_ ," he mused out loud. "There's a whole lot of good in you."

Chloe snorted. "Typical Adrien, always seeing the good in people. You better not be dodging the question!"

"I'm not, I'm getting to it!" Adrien chuckled, happy to have gotten a smile on her distraught face. "Like I was saying, you're not a bad person. As far as being a friend, no, I don't think you know how to fully be a good one. That's not necessarily your fault, though. It probably has a lot to do with how you were brought up. You never had the chance to learn how to be a good friend, so I don't think you should be faulted for not knowing any better." Chloe nodded silently, taking the criticism. Adrien continued, "I do think you _try_. Like, you remember to wish me happy birthday every year right at midnight. That's something a _great_ friend would do. You get things like that right, but then you'll kick people out of their seats just so you can be close to me in class. With stuff like that, you think you're doing something right and don't register what you're doing wrong."

"So," Adrien said with confidence, "No, you might not know how to be a good friend, but I definitely think you have the potential to. Are you a bad friend? Maybe at times. But you aren't a bad _person_ , and that's the important thing. I don't think a bad person could be anything other than a bad friend." Squeezing Chloe's shoulder, Adrien smiled. "As far as I'm concerned, it's never too late to be a good friend."

A twist of the wrist, and the hair tie was secured. Braid finished, no hair was left free for Chloe to anxiously abuse. Running her hand back to feel the plaits' texture, Chloe let his words turn over in her head.

"Are you offering to teach me?" she finally asked.

Adrien chuckled. "Well, it seems like I'm already your trigonometry teacher. Why not?"

Chloe felt moisture welling up in her eyes again, this time for different reasons. Wrapping her arms around Adrien, Chloe felt as though it was the first time she was ever truly hugging him. All the other times usually had been over the top displays meant for the people around her to see proof that her and Adrien were friends. Now, as she held onto him tightly, Chloe knew this hug wasn't for the sake of anyone else—just her and him.

"I'll become the best friend you've ever had," Chloe swore, always being one for dramatics. "So don't go giving up on me just yet."

Adrien smiled into her hair. "I couldn't give up on you if I tried."

* * *

Chloe Bourgeois was never one to half-ass anything. So when it came to reinventing herself, Chloe threw herself at the task with awe-inspiring dedication. Having lost everything else, this was the last thing she had to hold onto, and she was holding on for all she was worth.

Without Sabrina, Chloe's only friend was Adrien, who was rarely ever at school because of work. Meaning, for all intents and purposes, Chloe was completely alone in classes. People spotted that immediately, and whispered rumors soon became the background music to Chloe's life. Nobody ever said anything to her face, but she could tell that they were making fun of her apparent fall from grace. Chloe kept to herself. She didn't attempt to confront or befriend them. She had a friend in Adrien, and that was all she needed. Adrien, of course, tried to encourage her otherwise.

"It's important to make more friends!" he would insist. "You should keep yourself open to others."

"But _they_ aren't open to me," Chloe would always counter. "Everybody hated the person I was, and nobody's willing to overlook that to give the new me a chance. Plus, who needs some weak acquaintances when I have a friend like you?"

"You're thinking about things all wrong again," Adrien corrected. "I'm sure there are plenty of worthwhile people out there willing to give you a second chance, but they can't give you a second chance if you're not open to accepting it. And you never know! One of them might turn out to be just as good of a friend as me."

Chloe doubted it, but kept what Adrien said in the back of her mind. She decided she'd focus on that when the opportunity presented itself. All she was concerned about at the present was bettering herself. Chloe had set her mind on becoming the kind of friend that Adrien deserved, and in her mind, Adrien deserved nothing less than the best.

Learning became a major focus. One of Adrien's first pieces of advice when guiding Chloe onto the right track was taking control of her own responsibilities and being successful solely on her own abilities, not anyone else's. This began with schoolwork that Chloe had always skirted via Sabrina's assistance. It was surprisingly easy, given Chloe's circumstances. As sad as it sounded, not having any friends at school meant her only purpose in showing up was to learn. She was insanely behind, obviously, seeing as she hadn't paid attention in any of her classes all year. But Chloe doubled down, asking if she could attend Adrien's night tutoring classes at his house when he was in town. Her desperation to become the kind of friend to Adrien that he was to her was strong, and the moment Chloe set her mind to doing something, no matter the difficulty of the task, she was unstoppable.

After a month of transition, the results were staggering.

Chloe's father hadn't questioned Chloe staying out late. It was common for her to be out shopping for a lengthy amount of time. Only when she returned one night with an armful of books instead of shopping bags did he become curious.

"Adrien let me borrow them from his library after tutoring," Chloe explained. She looked tired, but happily accomplished.

The Mayor read the spines, his eyebrows furrowing at the complicated titles. "These are for your classes?" he asked uncertainly. Perhaps there'd been some big changes since his high school days.

"Yeah, well, some of them." Chloe pointed several. "These go into a bit more detail about what we're studying now, these are for getting ahead, and these ones just kind of caught my eye. Oh!" Between the dull, heavy books, she wiggled out a colorful cover. "And I bought a magazine for a quick study break!"

He looked like one of the textbooks had slapped him upside the head. "That's, uh, that's wonderful, darling."

Chloe gave him a smile, ran over to give him a kiss on the cheek, and headed upstairs. Not bothering to ask the butler for help like she normally would have with shopping bags, Chloe carried the back-breaking load up to her room as though it was no trouble at all. The Mayor had kept an eye on the light leaking under her door that night. He never heard the familiar sounds of her flatscreen or any music from her wireless stereo system, just the shuffle of paper. Only at 3:00 AM did the light finally go out.

Teachers noticed the change more than anyone. Mr. Durand was the first to say anything.

"I was hoping to discuss your performance in my class these past two months," he began, pulling out a vanilla folder from the confines of his desk.

Chloe sat across from him, trying to refrain from fidgeting. Before, she'd always brushed off teachers or the principal asking to meet with her, knowing a call to her dad could set things straight. But now that Chloe had come to care about her studies and was trying to rely on her own abilities, the idea that something was wrong had her in a panic.

"I've discussed my concerns with several other teachers who have seen a similar trend," Mr. Durand continued, flicking to an area in Chloe's graded work. "In October, your grades slipped significantly. You received zeroes in several courses at this time, and when you no longer got zeroes, they were still low-ranking scores."

Chloe paled and felt her hands go clammy. That was around the time Sabrina and her stopped being friends. _He's going to call you out on cheating through his class,_ Chloe's inner voice spelled out the worst possible scenario.

Mr. Durand saw the color drain from Chloe's face as he peaked over the rim of his glasses. "I see you know what I'm talking about." Chloe opened her mouth to speak, looking like she was at the brink of tears when he cut her off with a wave of his hand. "That's not what I'm concerned about, however. Perhaps, if you had mysteriously returned to perfect homework scores without paying a minute of attention in class, then I would have taken action. But, seeing your work these past two months, I see no reason to make an issue of it."

A mixture of lost and taken aback, Chloe managed, "I'm sorry, I don't understand, sir."

"People make mistakes. I can appreciate when someone makes a mistake and learns from it, as you clearly have." Mr. Durand flipped through the papers in the file. _0, 0, 10, 19, 17, 24, 40, 62, 70, 91, 97, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100._ "I am nothing if not understanding."

Chloe's mouth fumbled for words, but none came. _He's... Giving me a second chance?_

A rare smile cracked her teacher's stoney appearance. "Ms. Bourgeois, do you like math?"

"Yes, sir," Chloe answered, still awestruck at her luck.

"Good. I think you have quite the knack for it." He flipped to through several more pages of hundreds before reaching the last pages of her file. "I've been trying to test your limits these past three quizzes, and you still managed to get perfect marks on all of them." In some part of Chloe's mind, she remembered an increased number of complaints from her classmates at the recent difficulty of quizzes. Mr. Durand learned forward and wove his fingers together. "I wanted to discuss with you my concern that you're in the wrong math class, and I wanted to suggest the possibility of you taking a placement test."

Astonished, all Chloe could do was nod.

A turbulent freshman year closed out on a high note—Chloe's efforts caused her to move a year ahead in Language and Sciences and two years ahead in Math.

* * *

Chloe's new friendship skills were tested when Adrien nosedived second year.

Her first red flag was him not showing up all week for school when she knew for a fact he was off of work. The second red flag was Gabriel Agreste answering the door when she showed up to check on him. Not Adrien. Not Nathalie. Gabriel Agreste.

"He's not well," Gabriel explained when Chloe said why she had come to see Adrien.

_You're not looking too well either,_ Chloe felt tempted to say as she took in the man's weathered face. Knowing better, she kept her mouth shut.

"Should I come back another time?"

"No, please come in. He could really use some, uh, support right now. Nino just stopped by, but he didn't have much luck." Gabriel led her to his son's door despite the fact Chloe had visited countless times and probably could've found it blindfolded. He left her after staring at the door with a sobering look. The strangeness of everything made Chloe worried for all the right reasons.

She was about to knock when she heard a muffled conversation.

" _You can't keep turning people away, kid. You need them."_

" _The only thing I need is to be alone."_

" _They're worried for you. They want to help."_

Silence followed instead of an answer. After a couple seconds, Chloe finally knocked, fairly sure she'd just heard something extremely personal that wasn't meant for her ears.

"It's me," Chloe announced. A minute passed before the door clicked open.

He looked like shit. The dark bags under Adrien's eyes showed evidence of many sleepless nights. He was wrapped in a cocoon of blankets, as though he had only just managed to get out of bed, but had decided to take a piece of it with him. His cheekbones looked more pronounced, his hair looked like it hadn't seen a good wash in days, but most disturbingly, the usual light that twinkled in his eye was nowhere to be found—the fire that usually burned there was extinguished.

Chloe definitely now understood what Mr. Agreste meant when he said his son wasn't well. She felt her heart sink as she took in her best friend's appearance. Lack of sleep and motivation, change in eating habits, social isolation—all textbook symptoms of depression.

"Hey, Chloe." The greeting was delayed and lackluster. "Sorry, but I don't really think tonight's a good night for us to study. I was meaning to text you and cancel. I'll let you know when I'm feeling bett—"

"Uh-uh. Nope." Chloe stopped him dead, raising a hand to silence him. The sinking feeling in her chest was forced aside, a determination to take care of her friend rising to take its place. "I'm not talking to you like this. You need a shower and a sandwich before I listen to another word you have to say to me."

"I don't think—"

"No! Shut it! I'm making the rules here," Chloe commanded firmly, pushing the boy backwards as she forced herself into his room. Without pause, she forcefully escorted Adrien to the bathroom and threw the door shut behind him. Throwing a chair in front of it for good measure, she declared, "I'm going to make a sandwich, and I swear, if I don't hear water running when I get back up here, I will come in there and wash you myself! Got that?"

She didn't get a response, but she also wasn't expecting one. When she came back up, however, the sound of water splashing on tile filled the room. When Adrien emerged in a bathrobe, Chloe sat him in their usual studying spot, a towering sandwich placed in his lap. For an hour, Chloe did all the talking, periodically demanding that Adrien continue eating. Only when Chloe closed the cover of one book and moved to open another did Adrien speak up.

"You're not going to leave me alone." It wasn't a question, and they both knew it.

Chloe flipped to a new lesson without batting an eye. "Not a chance."

Adrien paused, looking down at the plate of food she had made him. "If you're doing this because you think it's some obligation as a friend, it's not. I don't want—"

"I heard you talking on the phone earlier," Chloe cut in. That caught Adrien's attention for sure; he hadn't been on the phone. "I don't know what's going on. I have no idea what you're going through. And, after seeing you and hearing that, I'm not quite sure what to think or do." She looked up from the page to look Adrien in the eye. "You say you don't want help. It's pretty damn obvious that you need help... From how you're acting, all I can assume is that you somehow feel you don't _deserve_ help."

Adrien was silent. He didn't make any attempt to correct her, instead choosing to fiddle with the remaining crusts of his sandwich.

"Maybe you could've fooled me before, but I'm insulted if you think you could shake me now." Chloe looked at Adrien with both concern and unyielding will. If Adrien thought he could keep her at a distance, he had another thing coming. "At my worst, you told me you couldn't give up on me if you tried. That goes _both ways_. So, I'm here for you whether you want it or not."

Dropping her voice to a softer tone, Chloe added, "You're all I have, Adrien. Without you, I'm alone." She carefully took his hands in hers. _"Nobody_ deserves to be alone. I don't care if you feel you deserve to suffer through this on your own. You _don't_ , and I'm not going to let you."

When Adrien didn't respond, Chloe returned to the lesson and pretended not to see the silent tears of what could only be relief stream down his face.

* * *

"I wanted to ask if I could stay the night." Chloe spoke more in an informative way, like she had already made up her mind about sleeping over and was simply letting Mr. Agreste know of her decision instead of asking permission.

She stood in the man's study, the place where she had finally found him sitting in an armchair, nursing a glass of Scotch. He had appeared unreachable at first, staring off at the portrait of his wife across the room. Chloe, of course, didn't know of the safe hidden behind it, where the man had once kept his Miraculous. Gabriel had released the kwami when he learned, but the safe remained far from empty. It would forever be full of painful reminders that not only had he failed his wife, but that his actions were what broke his son.

"Please," Gabriel said, apparently not too distant to be unable to hear Chloe. "He needs someone to look after him." Unspoken in his mind was the thought, _I don't trust myself to anymore._

Not knowing how to respond to his cryptic words, Chloe bowed her head. "Thank you," she said, backing up to leave.

Before the door was shut behind her, she caught Gabriel's words directed to his wife. "It's all my fault, and yet, he pays the price of my mistakes... I'm sorry."

* * *

Adrien first started sleepwalking when his mother disappeared. He had too much going on in his mind that it somehow managed to overtake him even in the confines of sleep. It was fairly simple and predictable; he would act on whatever had been haunting him that day. Usually, he ended up walking to sleep where his mother once did. Gabriel had also found Adrien in her closet, drawn to the place where his mother's scent still lingered. He would hold complete conversations with her, or at least that's what Gabriel assumed with only being able to hear Adrien's side. Sometimes, he would just wander around crying. Without fault, however, young Adrien would wake up the next morning in his bed where his dad had returned him. Every breakfast he would wear his same brave face, trying to assure his father that he was okay, not knowing of his sleepwalking adventures the night before that proved he was anything but.

The sleepwalking started up again after Ladybug's disappearance. It was just as bad as before, but now there was one glaring difference: Adrien would always try to sleep-save Ladybug by transforming into Chat Noir.

That one tiny difference was crashing news to Gabriel Agreste. What a way to find out you've been attacking your own son, right? The heavy stuff hit after Gabriel had calmed down enough from seeing his son transform into a sleep-fighting Chat Noir in his living room. He learned the full truth when his son started sleep talking.

"Ladybug can't be dead... She can't be... But there was blood on the ground... Her blood is on my hands..."

Hawkmoth had witnessed the akumatized construction worker land a hit on the mighty heroine, but he never got to see what followed. The villain had moved on to a different location, and Hawkmoth could only observe as much as his victims could. Gabriel hadn't wanted to jump to conclusions with Ladybug's recent absences, but now the truth was here in the flesh, delivered at the mouth of his own son.

He had killed someone. The fact that it was indirectly didn't make the burden any lighter to bear. He blamed himself much in the same way that Adrien did; neither of them had actually dealt the blow, but they'd had the power to stop it. He had killed Ladybug, breaking his son in the process.

Chloe had once witnessed Adrien sleepwalk years ago. That hadn't prepared her one bit for what was in store tonight.

A heel digging into her stomach flung Chloe over the cusp of consciousness with a vengeance, colorful language already flying before her eyes were open. _"God fucking damn it! OUCH!_ I'm trying to sleep here! Watch where you're stepping!" She was about to turn over and try to doze back off when a chorus of thumps sat her upright.

"Adrien, what the hell are you doing?" The whisper only got another thump as a response. With a heave and a groan at her tender stomach, Chloe leaned to flick on a lamp not far from her sleeping bag. Light flooded the room, and the girl could finally see the blonde facing away from her across the room. "Adrien?" Chloe asked again.

"M-hm," came the mumbled response. "Not now... I don't have time..." Adrien reached out his hand like he was trying to grasp a doorknob, but all that was in front of him was a bookcase. Another thump sounded out as Adrien's attempt at opening a non-existent door sent a book tumbling to the floor.

"What are you—" Chloe stopped as Adrien turned slightly. His eyes were open, though slightly hooded, a glassy sheen coating them. With more light, Adrien's sleepy mind realized its error, stepping a couple feet to the side before reaching the actual door he'd been aiming for. Turning its handle, the boy ungracefully staggered out. "Oh, God, he's sleepwalking," Chloe breathed aloud in disbelief before jumping up to follow after him.

The white glow of the moon was the only lighting outside the room, but Chloe didn't have to look far to find Adrien standing at the banister overlooking the ground floor. She knew she wasn't supposed to wake him. That was something Mr. Agreste had warned her about when she had experienced that one sleepwalking spell. He said that if she did, Adrien could be confused, panicked, or even violent, so it was best to just let him go until he crashed.

"We're not too late... Not this time," Adrien announced to the dark, empty house. Then, with a practiced flourish, Adrien called out, _"Plagg! Transform me!"_

A dark object flew past the side of Chloe's head before a series of green sparks came to life. Dumbfounded and mouth agape, Chloe watched as black leather wove its way over her friend until he stood in the unmistakable disguise of Chat Noir. A sharp pinch to her arm assured Chloe that she wasn't asleep herself.

Before she could react, Adrien had pulled himself atop the banister and was throwing himself over the edge.

"ADRIEN! NO!" Chloe rushed forward, but he was already out of reach. Crashing into the banister, all she could do was watch him fall. Her heart jumped into her throat, but Chat's instincts were still effective even when his brain was on autopilot. He stuck the landing as well as a half-asleep super hero could and remained couched down to the ground. Chloe was down the flight of stairs in an instant, immediately at Adrien's side to check if he'd hurt himself in any way. Not finding anything wrong, she allowed herself to breathe again. Only then did she notice that Adrien hadn't in fact landed on the ground. He was crouched on a mattress, a mattress that Chloe definitely didn't remember being there any of the other times she'd come downstairs. It had been placed in that exact spot not long ago, as though Adrien's leap had been anticipated.

"Idiot, don't go making me have a heart attack," Chloe almost cried in relief, giving him a light punch that she knew wasn't at risk of waking him from his deep sleep.

"No... No... She's gone," Adrien started talking and moving again, a slight tremor overtaking him. "Ladybug's gone... She's gone because of me... She's dead because of me!"

In a sudden rush, Chloe was thrown back as Adrien hurled his fists on the mattress, screaming in distress all the while. She sat back, useless to do anything but watch as her friend attempted to beat himself up because of his sleep terror. Perhaps the mattress wasn't there exclusively to break Adrien's fall.

Adrien eventually settled, curling into himself with the broken repetition, "Please, come back... Come back... I'll protect you, just come back..." Chloe approached the broken boy now that he was calm, sitting next to him to reassuringly pet his hair. Pained mumbling eventually turned to even breathing, and Chloe continued to sit at Adrien's side as another display of sparks returned him to the form she was more accustomed to.

"So that's what happened," Chloe finally said after thinking through his actions and the recent news about Ladybug being off the radar. Ladybug had died on his watch, and Adrien was crippled from self-blame of losing his friend. "Don't worry," Chloe said. "Everything will be fine."

"Heh, that's the same thing Ladybug promised before pulling a Humpty Dumpty and falling off the face of the Earth." The voice was heavy, but there was a hint of pained amusement. "Funny how the both of you try to comfort him the same way."

Chloe whirled around. The only other person who was in the house to her knowledge was Adrien's dad, and that was most definitely _not_ his voice. "Who's there?" Chloe demanded, scanning the shadows for the possible threat.

"Easy, don't go tryin' to stab me with a stiletto or something," came the joking reply. Chloe's eyes tracked a small shift in the blackness. "You don't remember my lovely voice from that 'phone call' earlier? Aw, I'm hurt. Allow me to introduce myself properly then." Plagg's sharp green eyes glowed to life as he floated into the moonlight. "The name's Plagg. I'm Adrien's kwami."

Chloe reached to pinch herself again. She must not have done it hard enough the first time. _Clearly,_ she had to be dreaming. When she looked up to still see the tiny floating creature's toothy grin, she shook her head in incredulity. "I don't believe it, I'm seeing things."

"Oh, believe it, sweetheart." Plagg's tail twitched impishly. "I'm the magic behind Chat Noir. Guess you're still getting used to that bit of news though, too, huh? You're taking it a whole lot better than his dad, if that helps anything."

Chloe blinked vigorously. "Okay, wait. Put the whole 'magic kwami' thing on hold, I want to revisit that _in detail_." She backed up her words by looking Plagg up and down cautiously like he was about to disappear. With all the questions that had sprouted in the last couple of minutes, she needed someone to cough up some answers. "Adrien's dad _knows_ about this?"

"Sleepwalking isn't exactly subtle, now is it?" Plagg gave an eyeroll. "It's not like I can prevent him from transforming. He says the magic words and _presto chango!_ The old man found out the first night. We've talked. Briefly." He ground the last part out through gritted teeth. "Let's just say I don't very much like the guy." In his mind, Plagg kept the rest of his emotions in check. It was a slight consolation to know that Gabriel was hating himself, but that didn't mean Plagg had to be happy about working together with the guy to help Adrien. Chloe, on the other hand, was the exact person he was looking for.

"You and him are the only people who know," Plagg pushed on. "The only reason I'm here talking to you is because the kid needs help, and me and him are the least qualified people to give that. I don't even know where to begin with human emotions, and his dad has a track record of hurting more than helping, so that leaves you... Congratulations."

Looking down at the blonde boy's head in her lap, Chloe tried to process the insane circus of which she'd just been declared ringleader. She was already going to help Adrien as best she could on her own, but working together with somebody who actually knew the circumstances of his turmoil would be invaluable in helping him through it.

Looking back up at the strange creature, Chloe demanded, "If I'm working with you, you better explain _everything."_

Plagg saw the hint of distrust in Chloe's eyes. Telling non-Miraculous holders the truth broke several dozen rules, but Plagg had already broken the biggest one the moment he chose to reveal himself. Seeing Adrien like this, the kwami couldn't care less about how many rules he broke if it meant a chance at getting his old partner back.

"You'll fix him?"

"I'll try." In cases like this, that was the most anyone could guarantee.

Plagg's teeth glinted as he grinned. "Then I guess I've got a lot of explaining to do."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, show of hands: who thought Chloe was gonna be a she-devil? *Raises own hand.* Fun Fact, I had it originally in mind to make Chloe be her classic self and be Marinette's rival. But where's the fun in two dimensional characters with no development?! Doubly Fun Fact, I only came up with the Adrien sleep-transforming into Chat Noir yesterday and went back to change everything... I did that instead of studying for exams. Smart, right?
> 
> Speaking of, I've got exams all these next two weeks, so I will not be posting this next weekend. I should post the weekend after though, so fear not. In place of a chapter, my talented roommate, who I blame for making me fall in love with this fandom, has been drawing fan art and started a comic of my story. She'll post some this upcoming weekend on her tumblr: killthestairs . tumblr . (c o m) / tagged / Break-Down-to-Build-Up (Currently dying because all she's posted under this tag at the moment is a joke sketch of Plagg with a nosebleed saying he's gay captioned with "Yo Elly, I'm very serious about this comic. 100% serious 100% of the time.")
> 
> Now, some observant readers might have noticed the "Part I" tacked onto the chapter title. It is synonymous with, "Oops. I didn't know this chapter was gonna be this 'effing long. I'll just chop it in half and pretend this was my plan the whole time. Totally not a mistake, all part of the plan." So, yeah. There will be a Part II to this Chloe backstory/redemption arc. Here's how it stands now: Chloe has become the very friend Adrien needs in his current crisis, she's learned a thing or two about the identity of Paris's Chat Noir from a sleepless night and a rule-breaking kwami, and Marinette has yet to return to school... How do once rivals turn into coworkers?


	13. Second Chances - Part II

Chapter 13: Second Chances - Part II

Where Adrien had Chloe to come to his aid, Gabriel had Nathalie.

The woman was unrelenting when it came to her work, after all, so it came as no surprise. It made no difference that he was her boss; Nathalie was there each day to pick him up and guide him back to work. With her insistent encouragement, Gabriel found improvement, managing to bury the majority of burdening blame and moving forward with his life. There was no knowing if Nathalie acted out of dedication to her job as his assistant or dedication to him as a person. It was likely a happy medium of the two. Perhaps Gabriel had anticipated that dedication—even counted on it.

So, when the day came for Adrien to fly off to London, Chloe felt she was leaving him in good hands. That didn't mean she didn't worry, of course.

"He's stopped sleepwalking now, but he still needs to remember his medication so he isn't restless during the night. Oh! And make sure he doesn't embarrass himself with that ridiculous British accent he's been attempting. If he does that on camera, I can't be seen with him in public ever again... And don't forget that—"

"I won't forget anything. I'm an assistant, not a clueless babysitter. Have some faith," Nathalie said, adjusting her carry-on bag. The crisp, professional air about her was broken by a sideways smile. "You gave him his legs, I'll help him start walking, and when he's ready to run, he'll run. He'll get there someday, don't worry."

Chloe swallowed the built up emotion in her throat, forcing herself to relax at Nathalie's words. It was true. After working to get Adrien to a more stable state, he was finally taking his first step towards normalcy. He was taking on a long-term job in London. He'd be in the public eye again, trying to replicate the same lively, ray of sunshine persona that defined his success. It was no small task, but Adrien had accepted the challenge. Chloe knew his reasons were mixed, a large part probably being a need to leave Paris for a while and escape into something that was his own and held no reminders. Modeling was the perfect answer.

"C-Chloe. You're crushing my lungs," Adrien gasped as Chloe gave him a hug goodbye.

"I do it because I care," Chloe said defensively, constricting harder.

"Killing with kindness is still killing, ya know?" Adrien choked through a grin.

Chloe released him only to free up a hand to playfully jab him. "Oh, _ha ha_. Get a better sense of humor while you're away."

"Only if you get some new friends," Adrien countered.

"I have friends," Chloe said. It was a clear lie, and they both knew it.

Adrien might not go to school with Chloe, but he had never seen or heard about a single so-called friend unless he prompted her. Hell, he was still her shopping buddy. And he was an _awful_ person to shop with. People recognized him too easily and their trips out would turn into autograph sessions instead of Chloe finding a new outfit. If Chloe had so much as a single friend besides him, Adrien was certain he wouldn't be the one getting dragged to the mall.

"Fine," Adrien let it slide. "But still, if I'm leaving, then you need someone to take my place. And I expect a call when you find a new study partner."

Chloe rolled her eyes. "You're not disappearing forever. I can survive without you for a year or two."

Only after the words had left her did Chloe realize her slip up. Adrien's face tightened with a strained smile, trying not to think about the person who _did_ disappear forever, leaving him to figure out if he truly could survive without her.

"Yeah," Adrien said. His words were robotic. "I guess I worry too much, huh?"

When Nathalie called out, her best friend walked away on autopilot to board the jet. As Chloe watched the jet tear into the sky, she hoped for the answers Adrien would find on his journey:

Yes. He could survive Ladybug's death.

* * *

Marinette's return was broadcast on the morning announcements. Chloe tuned in just in time to hear the familiar name echo down the halls.

" _Today, one of our old students returns to us. Ms. Marinette Dupain-Cheng's reasons for leaving last year were respectively kept private, but it has been requested that everyone be informed of her condition now that she has returned."_ There was a rustling of paper, and the announcer cleared his throat. _"Last year, Ms. Dupain-Cheng experienced an accident that resulted in extensive memory loss."_

A murmur rippled across the room. Classmates turned to each other, whispering fervently about the news and attempting to learn anything known about the unfortunate girl with memory loss. Chloe sat amidst the turning tide, motionless. She blinked. The motion felt both abrupt and agonizingly slow.

Chloe hadn't talked to Marinette since middle school. Yes, Chloe had always been aware of the fact that she and Marinette chose to attend the same high school, but she had not spoken to the girl once in their time here. They had never been in a class together, and while Chloe saw her in the corridors on the rare occasion that she drifted to an outlying hallway, there had always been the urge to avoid her at all costs. It was like that with all of her old classmates.

Chloe, finally capable of seeing how she'd mistreated her former classmates, never found the courage to face them. They had a right to hate her, but the possibility of facing that hate after everything she'd gone through to change was terrifying. It was terrifying because she wanted to apologize, but didn't know where to begin and dreaded how it would end. Was it even possible for them to accept something like that? Did she even deserve to be forgiven? Chloe didn't have the answers. So, she simply avoided ever finding out.

" _The damage to her memory spans back many years. Anyone who has come in contact with Ms. Dupain-Cheng in that time is advised to be cautious in meeting her. She will likely have no recollection of old acquaintances or classmates, but do try approaching her, and if she can't remember you instantly, her memory should be triggered in due time. However, it is deeply stressed that students should not crowd Ms. Dupain-Cheng. Her brain is still recovering, and it does not cope well with an overload of information. So, please try not to have more than one person speak to her at a time, and don't try to force memory recollection. Let her remember things at her own speed. Any questions or concerns can be directed to Ms. Alya Césaire, who will be assisting Ms. Dupain-Cheng in her acclimation... That is all."_

Chloe was presented with the opportunity to find her answers that very same afternoon. It wasn't particularly hard to notice Marinette when a whole hallway was a traffic jam of clusters of people trying to catch a glimpse of the day's celebrity. Stuck in a classroom doorway, Chloe was well within hearing range of Marinette and Alya as they walked past.

"So I guess 'don't crowd' translates to 'crowd at a respectable distance,' huh?" Chloe caught Alya's remark as the girl passed by.

"Oh, come on. Since when did anyone ever pay attention to what the announcements say?" Marinette asked, taking a moment to look around at the mass of people before shifting her eyes to the ground at the overwhelming number of faces. "Maybe we should call it an early day," she said, slightly strained and trying her best to mask her disappointment of not lasting the full school day.

A sudden wave of dizziness from exertion caused Marinette to stumble, and a last minute reflex caused her arm to latch onto the nearest possible thing to steady herself. This just so happened to be the strap of Chloe's bookbag. Thankfully far more sturdy than the strap that hadn't survived the two's initial encounter, the bag held Marinette's weight without any damage. Chloe, at the sudden force, was thrown sideways and needed to brace herself on the doorframe for support.

The moment came and went, and Marinette was upright once more.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry!" Marinette said immediately. Appreciatively putting a hand on Chloe's shoulder, she went on to say, "Dizziness definitely doesn't help my clumsiness. Thanks for the save!"

Marinette gave a dismissive laugh at the whole ordeal, and Chloe was left speechless. The girl she had once routinely humiliated was looking her in the eye, smiling, and squeezing her shoulder like she would a friend. No, this most certainly wasn't how she imagined her next conversation with Marinette going.

"U-Um, yeah. No problem," Chloe finally managed.

"Okay, one surprise trust fall is enough for now. Take it easy. An early day it is," Alya decided aloud, taking Marinette's forearm to guide and support if necessary. Alya briefly locked eyes with Chloe before steering Marinette away. Seeing something, or maybe a lack of something, Alya's face softened marginally. "Thank you," she said with full sincerity.

And that brought Chloe two-for-two on unlikely outcomes. After remaining frozen in place a minute after her old classmates had gone, someone eventually tapped on Chloe's shoulder to get by, snapping the blonde back to attention. Chloe went about the rest of her day uninterrupted, paying no mind to the nagging thoughts dancing around her head.

But the day's events kept her awake that night. In particular, her interaction with Marinette had Chloe staring up at her ceiling for hours. There hadn't been any recognition in Marinette's eyes. No hint of the wrongs that Chloe had done to her. Marinette had only seen Chloe in her present self, and she had treated her as a friend.

A part of Chloe's mind entertained the idea of living that feeling again. Exploring it. Embracing it. Coming to know a Marinette that didn't recall memories of a manipulative, snobbish brat when she looked at Chloe. It was a foolish thought to entertain, Chloe knew. If she was given another minute with Marinette, that dream would undoubtedly have shattered the moment Marinette's brain connected enough pieces.

Chloe eventually drifted to sleep after accepting the inevitability that was Marinette linking her to her past self. Even still, she cherished the moment, repeating Marinette's smile over and over again in her mind to relive the kindness and delude herself into feeling that in some way she was worthy of it.

* * *

_Déjà vu_ , to a recovering Marinette, was so common that she could no longer mark where the sensation began and where it ended. Most of everything she saw she was seeing for a second time, so the feeling was only natural. Marinette had come to expect it. This made for a fairly confusing ordeal when something she was subconsciously expecting didn't go as remembered.

For instance, Marinette might have the passing sensation that she was meant to babysit Manon after school. One afternoon, Marinette found herself at Ms. Chamack's door, only to be reminded by the family friend that Manon was now several years older and no longer required a babysitter. Such seeming contradictions felt unnatural. It was like stroking sandpaper and feeling the touch of silk. Luckily, confusing certain aspects of a memory was rare, sparing Marinette from frequently having to sort out reality.

However, faced with today's Chloe Bourgeois, a far cry from the classic Chloe of her memories, Marinette's brain was in for quite the puzzle.

* * *

Of the four desks at the table, only one was filled. Unknowingly, the familiarity of seeing Chloe sitting alone was what caught Marinette's eye when she walked into the room. Just as before, Marinette was drawn to help.

"Now that all the classes have arrived, I'll go over the instructions one more time." Waving in the last class to stand at the far side of the room, Mr. Lacroix then clapped his hands together and began. "As many of you may already know, there is a mandatory senior project for all business and fashion students. This project also doubles as a competition. Keep in mind, your project is of great importance to not only your grade, but also to your future in the industry. This is a platform. _Use it as such_." His eyes raked the crowd, as though daring anyone not willing to take the challenge seriously to leave. When everyone remained seated, he continued.

"In previous years, this was an independent project. You've probably guessed by the desk arrangement that this will no longer be the case. For an additional challenge, your teachers have decided to make this a cross-classroom group project. This will add an element of realism—while your success largely relies on individual capabilities, being able the mesh and work cohesively with coworkers is arguably the most important and necessary skill in today's world."

"We ask that you separate into groups of four. Not three. Not five. Four. Don't think I was born yesterday and come to me with excuses; I know everything divides evenly. And the classes _must_ mix. There should be at least one business and one fashion expert in each group. For the first couple of classes, those educated in business will have a blue tag, and those educated in fashion will have a red one. You will be designing and producing a runway-worthy piece, so both aspects of expertise are key in making a finished product given your limited resources and time constraints."

"My students are already seated. I trust that you can sort yourselves into the remaining seats." Seeing students silently making eye contact with their desired partners before eyeing the open desks, Mr. Lacroix grinned. "Further instructions will be on handouts. Good luck."

Organized chaos ensued. Amidst every student darting for a desk, Chloe waited for the three seats around her to be filled by whoever remained after the dust had settled. Instead, the whine of a chair being pulled out next to her proved Chloe wrong.

"Hey again!" A familiar voice greeted Chloe, making her jump. "Sorry, I didn't properly introduce myself last time. My name's Marinette."

Chloe turned to her left to see bubbly, blue eyes and an eager, open hand. And here Chloe thought she would just avoid Marinette and keep hope alive that the girl would never remember her old, bitchy ways. Well, that dream was dead in the water. The clock was ticking; it was only a matter of time before Marinette found out.

Chloe took her hand cautiously. "Chloe," she replied, feeling like saying her name alone was walking on eggshells. But Marinette's expression didn't sour. "Nice to, uh, meet you."

"You, too!" Marinette immediately echoed. Turning away for a moment, the clueless girl missed the look of shock on Chloe's face as she waved over her best friend. "Alya! Alya, over here!"

Soon, the seat across from Marinette was filled as Alya joined the table. "Good, at least now I know I'm not gonna fail this course and have to repeat senior year," Alya breathed in relief as she sat down. Looking to Marinette she said, "With you, I'm golden."

"Don't say stuff like that!" Marinette scolded. "You'll make Chloe think you'll be a deadbeat partner!" To Chloe, she hurriedly promised, "She's not, I swear. She can just be a bit dramatic at times." Flipping back to Alya, it then seemed to occur to Marinette that she hadn't introduced the two. "Oh, right! Alya, this is Chloe. Chloe, Alya."

"I already know Chloe," Alya supplied. Chloe couldn't help but wonder if it was purposeful that Alya hadn't added, 'and you knew her, too.' It was also surprising that her name held no malice, something Chloe had been expecting.

"God, this is the third time today," Marinette groaned to herself. "I _really_ need to start asking that first."

It took a while for their final group member to arrive. When every other group had been decided, the last piece fell into place with Nathanaël sitting across from Chloe.

"Hey," Nathanaël said as he slumped into his chair. Once seated, he looked around at the faces of his teammates. "Wow, I lucked out!" he reveled, looking back and forth between Marinette and Alya. "And here I was worried that I'd get a group of total strangers. I think this is the best possible group I could've hoped for." The last statement was said sheepishly, accompanied by him scratching the back of his head.

"Nathanaël!" Marinette greeted. She must have been reintroduced to him sometime in the past week. "Okay, I second Alya. _Now_ our group is golden."

A million thoughts bombarded Chloe, but two rose to the forefront.

One: somewhere in between middle school and now, Nathanaël had hit puberty, and he'd hit it _hard_. Chloe was half certain that Nathanaël had accidentally taken two swipes at it when he'd only meant for one, and some kid elsewhere in the world would remain forever short and high-pitched to pay for his mistake and retain balance. Tall, toned, flaming hair tied back to frame a jagged face and bright eyes, she barely recognized the guy.

"Nathanaël, this is Chloe. Chloe, Nathanaël," Marinette introduced enthusiastically.

"Fourth time," Alya chimed.

" _Dammit!_ "

Nathanaël chuckled as Marinette hung her head. "Aw, you didn't have to correct her! I was going to let her have it." He turned his attention to Chloe. "It's been quite a while, after all."

Chloe swallowed. "Yeah... Quite a while."

Two: there was now yet another old classmate to bring up the demons of her past.

Nathanaël's "best possible group" was Chloe's worst possible nightmare.

* * *

"Mind if I interrupt?"

The voice cut through her study music and made Chloe jump. Pulling out an earbud and sitting up from her work, Chloe found Alya seated across from her, waiting for an answer.

"Huh?"

"Can we talk?" The fact that she was already sitting didn't make it much of a question.

"Sure?" Chloe pulled out her other earbud. "I didn't think we had anything to talk about... Did you already have a question about the project?"

"No, it's about Marinette." Alya paused. "And how you pretty much avoided all eye contact and spoke a total of ten words to her last class."

"I wasn't—"

"Ya know, Nino would talk about you a lot. I wouldn't call it complaining, but if you asked me, I definitely would've said he was a tiny bit jealous of how much time you spent with Adrien."

Chloe blinked and felt her face contort in confusion. Why the sudden change of topic? This hadn't been what they were talking about at all.

"He'd go on and on, 'Adrien's helping Chloe with this,' and 'Adrien's teaching Chloe that.' I didn't buy the whole 'she's decided to become a decent person overnight' shtick. But Nino kept talking about it. I didn't see you around school though, so there wasn't any solid proof. I found it so unbelievable that one day I called him out on making the whole thing up. I asked him, 'Why haven't I seen this new, reformed Chloe then? Last I saw her, she looked like her normal, stuck-up self.' It distracted him from his regular tangent and made him think for a second. He eventually came up with, 'I think she's ashamed.'"

Alya lifted Chloe's book enough to see the cover, mockingly retched, and continued. "He said Adrien didn't talk about what he felt he didn't have the right to talk about, so he had only told Nino that you and Sabrina had ended on bad terms. Nino assumed that's where your revelation came from and guessed that once you'd moved on to become this new person, it hurt to look back."

"He said, 'I think Chloe feels guilty when she's reminded of who she was. She's too ashamed to face anyone.'" Alya looked at Chloe. "I wasn't able to tell if he was right until today." She paused, trying to gauge Chloe's reaction.

"You don't want Marinette to remember you, do you? You were attempting to avoid triggering her memory. You'd rather she only know you as you are now, so you'd have one less person to feel guilty about?"

Chloe was silent. Alya briefly let the silence marinate before following up with, "Sorry, that's really personal. You don't have to answer that." Acting like she had never broached the topic, Alya leaned back in her chair to look nonchalantly at the ceiling.

"Anyway, Nino and I broke up. Adrien became withdrawn, and I left to help Marinette. Nino couldn't deal with the changes. He moved. I remember being disappointed in him. Not because he left me—I can handle myself just fine. I was disappointed that he left Adrien, who desperately needed help and support."

"I couldn't get through to Adrien, but I called his father. His assistant answered, and when I expressed that I was a worried friend and wanted to help Adrien, she told me that somebody else was already doing just that. I asked for a name, and she told me, 'Chloe Bourgeois.' Whatever proof I thought I needed to determine if you had really changed... I guess that was it."

Chloe didn't know how to react. "I don't know what I'm supposed to say to that," she admitted.

"I don't think you really need to say anything," Alya said, shrugging. "I just wanted to say that I've been forced to grow up a great deal this past year, and I think it'd be childish of me to hold something against you when you're clearly not the same person now that you were then... You seem like a decent person, and I'm happy to have you in our group. I hope you feel the same way."

When Chloe failed to respond, Alya backed out her chair and stood. "And just so you know," she added, "I expected Marinette to remember you immediately, too. When she didn't after running into you, I thought it was a fluke from dizziness or mental exhaustion. But when she didn't the second time, I realized that her brain must legitimately have trouble recalling you. I don't know if it has to do with the changes to your personality or that her first re-encounter with you was positive instead of negative, but it is what it is."

Alya kept private her likely suspicion that Marinette struggling to remember Chloe might have something to do with how close her memories of Chloe were tied with Adrien. It'd been similar when Alya was trying to remind Marinette about Nino.

"Her doctor said it was best if Marinette tried to remember people on her own, so I usually don't go out of my way to remind her of anyone. I don't speak for Nathanaël though, so I suggest talking to him to see if he's willing to do the same."

"In the meantime," Alya offered, "I say be yourself and see how it plays out."

* * *

Chloe caught Nathanaël at his locker the next day. It was surprisingly easy to find. All she had to do was give a passing girl a description of the guy, and some intense blushing and babbling later, Chloe had directions. The hard part had been actually talking to him.

"Okay. Rewind." Nathanaël closed his locker to give his full attention. Chloe wished he'd left it open. "Why are you even worried about me talking about you in middle school?"

"Because I want a shot at Marinette getting to know me now, not remembering how I was then," Chloe repeated, carefully moving a hair back into place to look more composed than she felt.

"Yeah, I got that part," Nathanaël said, crossing his arms loosely. The body language didn't read as angry, but as confused. "What I don't get is why you think I'd mess that up for you."

Chloe blinked rapidly. "Well, no, not on purpose." She could feel his turquoise eyes on her, and naturally looked in every other conceivable direction.

"Really?" Nathanaël questioned. "Because I don't feel like you'd be asking me like this unless you felt I had a _reason_ to want to tell Marinette."

He had her. And when Chloe opened and closed her mouth in a failed denial, he knew it.

Eyebrows scrunched together, Nathanaël bent down to try to catch Chloe's wandering eye. "Do you think I hate you or something?" Chloe's gaze followed a student walking at the opposite end of the hall. _"Hey."_ Nathanaël snapped his fingers in front of her face. The action, coming from Nathanaël, was startlingly unexpected enough to demand her attention. "Well? Do you?"

His intent eyes drained away any possibility of a diversion. Chloe gave a weak shrug. "I don't know... I'd hate me, if I were you."

Nathanaël's eyebrows rose. "Well, I don't." He sounded a little taken aback that he had to actually say the words out loud. "I think I'd have to be a bit demented to hold a three year grudge."

"I humiliated you," Chloe pointed out.

"No, _Ms. Mendeleiev_ humiliated me," Nathanaël corrected. " _She_ was the one who tore up my notebook and put me down. All you did was point out that I had a crush on Marinette. Kinda embarrassing, yeah, but not a huge deal. Definitely not something to _hate_ you over."

Nathanaël gave a relaxed eyeroll. "And like I said, that was three years ago. People can change. From what I hear, you changed a great deal. I changed, too."

_Yeah, no shit_. Chloe kept the comment to herself, but couldn't help thinking it as she gave a once-over to the previously shy boy that hardly spoke, who was now talking to her with confidence.

"I can stand up for myself a lot better now than I could then, so trust me, if I actually hated you, I'd let you know." Nathanaël smirked.

As he finished, the bell chimed, signalling for students to make their way to class. Hiking his bag onto his shoulder and consulting the clock across the hall, Nathanaël motioned in the direction of their last class of the day. "That's our cue." He started walking, but when Chloe didn't fall in step, he paused. "You coming? It won't be much of a group project if we're missing part of the group."

They walked to class in silence. Companionable silence, maybe? Chloe was out of touch with what that felt like. Eventually, the silence was broken by a mumble when Nathanaël held open the classroom door for her.

"Thank you." Chloe wasn't talking about the door. Nathanaël was tempted to say she didn't need to thank him, but one look at her told him the words meant too much to be turned away.

Instead, Nathanaël nodded towards their group table. "Come on," he said, "I think we'd _all_ like a chance to get to know you."

* * *

_Talk about your skill strengths._

The command was scrawled across the chalkboard, and Mr. Lacroix was nowhere in sight. It was going to be one of _those_ classes. Chloe determined it meant there'd be no hand-holding in this project; every group was left to their own devices.

"Skill strengths?" Marinette read aloud. "That's easy enough!" Dipping a hand into her bag, Marinette pulled out a piece of paper and wrote down each group member's name. She jotted notes next to her own as she spoke. "I'm into Fashion Design." Marinette poked her red tag with the pencil's eraser. "I like sketching and creating clothing the most, but I'm good with accessories, too. I have more ideas than I know what to do with, so if you don't like one, there's plenty to choose from." A couple bullets down, Marinette paused in thought before adding, "Oh! And I'm also a killer baker, so if we pull any all-nighters, I've got snacks covered!"

Alya snorted. "Good! Glad to know my number one concern will be addressed!" It earned her a kick under the table, but the jab was well worth it. "Kidding, kidding," she laughed.

"Well, I'm Business," Alya began, carrying on from Marinette's example. She flicked the blue tag on her shirt. "Making plans, handling finances and resources, networking—all the fundamental stuff. I'll keep you guys connected, in check, and on schedule."

After Marinette had scribbled her skills down, Nathanaël started.

"I'm actually bridging both programs," he said, gesturing at his lack of a colored tag. "I plan to create my own business, and I like fashion, but I'm not sure if I want to go fully in that direction. I'm big on Technical Design, which is more engineering based. Basically, I figure out how to bring sketches to life and produce what's on the page."

Marinette nodded to herself as she wrote, looking up when she finished. "And Chloe?"

Remembering Alya, Nathanaël, and above all, Adrien's words of encouragement, Chloe swallowed the nerves holding her back. Marinette might remember her, or she might not. Either way, Chloe was going to take her second chance and run with it.

"I'm in Fashion, too," Chloe said. "I know the basics of designing and like handbags and shoes the most. I was hoping to go into a weird niche though. Fashion Trend Analysis and Prediction."

Marinette raised her eyebrows in surprise. "So, you guess fashion trends?"

"Kind of. A bit more complex than guessing," Chloe explained. "I'm really good at math, and I didn't want that to go to waste. It's a hybrid of genius forecasting and trend extrapolation. Like, a melting pot of intuition, insight, data cycles, and mathematical models. From that, I can figure out what styles will be hot based on stuff like location or time."

Looking around the table and getting a mixture of confused stares, Chloe simplified, "I can do research, crunch numbers, and essentially tell you what direction to go in that gives our design the best chance at winning this competition."

A grin broke out on Nathanaël's face. " _That_ we can work with."

Alya nodded in agreement. "Sounds good to me."

Marinette proudly looked down at her summary sheet. "Those other teams don't stand a chance!"

* * *

Being a part of something felt... _Surreal_. Chloe couldn't find any other word to describe it. Over the course of their group project, she happily stumbled across these surreal-feeling moments and held them close.

* * *

"Sleepover?"

"Yeah," Marinette said, already unfurling some blankets on the ground. "We've been sketching and making plans for hours, and it's already so dark out. Why not just commit to working ourselves to sleep?"

Staying at Adrien's was more like babysitting a sleepwalking superhero than a sleepover. The last actual sleepover Chloe had was with Sabrina. This made Chloe hesitant, but after some encouragement from Alya that they could make some serious work progress, Chloe agreed. It was the best thing she'd ever been talked into.

There were 3 A.M. cookies. They listened to every Jagged Stone album back to back. Nathanaël took a half-hour nap and woke to find his nails freshly painted and no one to fess up for the crime. They nearly pulled an all-nighter, and everyone woke up in a tangled mess of limbs, pillows, and paper. As a group, they walked together to school—the girls wearing loaned outfits from Marinette and Nathanaël in mismatched clothes that were meant for gym class. And when they finally got to their senior development class, they all fell asleep at their desks instead of getting any work done.

It was aimless. It was fulfilling. It was a night Chloe wouldn't trade for the world.

* * *

"Every other group is hiring amateur models," Chloe said.

"Exactly!" Alya exclaimed. "Do you know how much money we could save by just having _you_ as our model? Answer: a ton! We'd get a huge financial advantage!"

"I don't know about this—"

"Oh, come on! They didn't ban it in the rules! They were practically begging for people to find loopholes like this!" Alya pled.

"It's a good plan," Nathanaël seconded. "And you'd be perfect for the role."

"You've had some experience, right? And your hair would go so nicely with the colors you picked!" Marinette added.

Being the center of attention was something that Chloe had cautiously avoided the last couple of years. It was a toxic position to be in, she thought. But in the moments of reassurance in her modeling their designs and undivided care in taking her measurements to alter sketch dimensions, Chloe learned it was only the negative attention she should fear, and that this positive attention was meant to be cherished.

* * *

Going shopping with Adrien had been a nightmare. With Marinette, it was a dream.

"What about these ones?" Marinette struggled with juggling the bags of cloth she'd purchased to point out the shoes. "It looks easy to strip and refashion the design."

Chloe considered them for a moment. "They're not quite what I had in mind, but the shape is compatible. They're okay."

"Hm," Marinette hummed. "Try them on," she suddenly commanded.

"Really?"

"Yeah," Marinette insisted. "I've just got a feeling about them."

A minute later, Chloe was humoring her whim. The moment she was standing, Marinette started nodding furiously.

"They're perfect," she declared, grinning at her partner like a lunatic. "Your calves look gorgeous with them. You'll be the star of the runway in these!" After a requested spin and walk, Marinette had made up her mind. "We're getting them."

Chloe had missed shopping with a friend.

* * *

"Are you going to tell us where we're going now? You've been driving for an hour," Nathanaël questioned the back of Alya's head. They'd been driving so long that Marinette had already conked out in the passenger seat.

"Sure," Alya laughed. "We're a safe enough distance now that it'd be stupid to turn back!"

"Oh God," Chloe said from the back seat. "This trip isn't related to the project at all, is it?"

"No, it is!" Alya said with a smile. "Breaks are a necessary part of projects!"

"What is this 'break' then?" Nathanaël asked from beside Chloe.

Taking her final exit, the answer soon became apparent. "The beach!"

The spontaneous day trip was better than any expensive cruise or vacation that Chloe had ever experienced. Marinette woke up to sand and sun, Alya picked out the perfect tanning spot, and Nathanaël disappeared to rent a surfboard the minute his shoes hit pavement. Chloe relaxed the day away in the lull of the waves. Floating on her back, she achieved weightlessness, and when she returned to be with the others on the shore, she swore she was still soaring.

* * *

"You know, at the beginning of all of this, you said this was the best group you could've hoped for." Chloe watched Nathanaël measure her finger a second time before switching to make adjustments to the ring band. "And I thought it was the worst thing that had ever happened to me," Chloe said, chuckling. She certainly wouldn't have predicted anything going this well. "But now, I think I've got to admit... You were right."

"Could you repeat that clearly into the microphone?" Nathanaël joked, looking up from his work long enough to see Chloe roll her eyes.

"Don't push your luck," she warned.

The classroom was full of frantic students working up a storm, but their table was calm and half empty. Marinette and Alya were away working on the dress at home. They were the only group ahead of schedule and were simply working on the final touches in this homestretch. Chloe's work had long since been done; all that was left was for her to strut the runway and win them the competition.

With a smile, Nathanaël returned to tinkering with the ring. "The actual reason I was so excited to be in the group was just because Marinette was in it," he admitted easily. He didn't even blush, and that was something that Chloe noticed Nathanaël had quite the habit of doing. "I still had a stupid little crush on her then."

"Then?" Chloe asked, eyebrow quirked. "Not anymore?"

"No," Nathanaël answered, giving a slight shake of his head. "Like I said, it was a stupid schoolboy crush that I was still holding onto. I barely even knew her to begin with, but I guess I made it out to be like I knew her in my mind." Each ring finally the appropriate size, Nathanaël sat back, satisfied. "Though I stand by this being the best group I could've asked for," he said, looking over at Chloe. "Maybe not for the reasons I expected, but I think the unexpectedness of it made it that much better."

Testing to make sure, Nathanaël slipped what he knew to be Chloe's favorite ring onto her finger. It was a perfect fit.

* * *

"Hey, Marinette?"

"Yeah?" Marinette paused, a piece of sushi raised halfway to her lips.

The two had come to the little Japanese place in the mall for an end-of-year hurrah at finishing their project. Maybe it was because they were here for fun and not work that Chloe felt enough courage to ask.

"Do you remember me at all?" Chloe asked, but already felt she knew the answer.

In the past few months, there were countless weird reactions Marinette had when around Chloe. Marinette would get headaches. She'd sometimes space out looking straight at Chloe and ask her to repeat whatever she just said. Her face would randomly contort into a different expression. And occasionally, Marinette would spit out some random knowledge about the blonde that Chloe was ninety-nine percent certain she hadn't told her.

A look of surprise dawned on Marinette. Not surprise at the content of Chloe's question, but merely that it was finally being addressed.

"Bits and pieces," Marinette eventually answered, popping the sushi into her mouth. "Not a lot in the beginning, but stuff started coming through after a while."

"You... Why didn't you say anything?" Chloe asked, her own food entirely forgotten.

"Well, I didn't really think it mattered."

Marinette said it like it was the simplest thing to understand.

"I don't live in the past. People always seem to think that I'm the same person from before, but I'm not. Not entirely, at least. I'm still me, but I like to think that I'm a different version of me, if that makes any sense," Marinette explained between bites. "So, if I'm this new version of me, and you're this new version of you, then I don't see why we can't treat this as a fresh start and be friends."

Chloe didn't realize she was crying until there was a napkin pressed to her cheek and Marinette was dabbing away her tears.

* * *

They had a small bonfire to celebrate their victory. All the others had fallen asleep next to the smoldering embers that remained, and it was then that Chloe had snuck away to make a much-needed phone call.

' _You've reached Adrien Agreste's personal line. I am not available. I am currently taking some personal time due to recent events. I ask not to be contacted during this time. Thank you for your concern. Do not leave a message.'_

Chloe disregarded the automated message and waited for the beep. "I know you still listen to these things, Adrien," she immediately called him out. "I didn't want to leave a message with Nathalie, but I promised you a call."

"That thing you told me to find?" Looking back over her shoulder to the figures splayed out on blankets, Chloe smiled. "I think I found it. They're not great study partners or anything—don't worry, you're still number one—but they're... A lot to me."

Chloe was silent for a while as she looked up to the sky. "I hope you're finding something to make you happy, too."

* * *

After high school, Chloe's goal was to make it in New York City. She took an additional year to finish her already partially completed Associate's Degree in Mathematics, but after that, she couldn't waste another moment.

So began a year of job hunting. She started off strong—three interviews in one week. But when each place got back to her in an uncanny, timely manner and each letter included her father's name, Chloe realized the positions had been bought instead of earned.

After explicitly telling her father to remain uninvolved, Chloe found the process to be a great deal harder. Underqualified and inexperienced. Those were the words she heard over and over again. At the end of the year, feeling the environment to be too competitive and her options exhausted, Chloe returned to Paris. The job environment wasn't much different, but it was home. After a month or two, Chloe unknowingly stumbled into her fated interview.

"Hi, I'm—"  
_"Chloe?"_

Halfway through shutting the door behind her, Chloe saw the face of her interviewer. _"Marinette?"_ she exclaimed, shock apparent for both women. It took Chloe a couple seconds to piece it together. "Oh my gosh, you're interviewing for your company! I knew you said you were starting up, but _wow_... You're actually going big," Chloe said, completely in awe.

Chloe sat down, locking them in an hour long catch-up session. Marinette was quick to get her up to speed on everything she'd missed while in America, and Chloe was eager to listen. It filled her with such pride hearing her friend go on about her and Alya building up DCD and all the well-deserved success coming their way.

"It's all been so crazy," Marinette exhaled. "But it's been so worth it."

"No kidding," Chloe said, breathless. Taking a moment, she finally noticed the clock behind Marinette's head. "Well, I better let you get back to this," Chloe said, standing to leave. "How does meeting for coffee later tonight sound?"

"What do you mean, 'get back to this'?" Marinette asked, confused. "I'm done. You've got the job."

Chloe began to shake her head. "No, really. I don't want some position handed to me as a favor."

"A _favor?"_ Marinette asked incredulously. "That's what you think this is? You're joking, right?" Standing up and rounding the desk, Marinette moved to grab Chloe by her shoulders. "That project, us working together, was what launched my career. If that's not a successful trial run, I don't know what is! I'd be an idiot _not_ to hire you!"

"So, what do you say?" Marinette, eyes alight with a passionate fire, extended her hand. "Will you join DCD with me?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How did I ever think I would fit this all in one chapter?... Ah, Finals. Makes your brain go to mush. Sorry I missed last Saturday. I severely underestimated packing time.
> 
> Anyway... Who would ever hire (let alone befriend) their reformed rival? Alya was right; "unconventional" really does sum up DCD. The Chloe arc, complete with friendship montage, has come to a close! Thanks for humoring my ramblings. We return to our regularly scheduled program and full cast next week... Happy shipping.


	14. Collision Course

Chapter 14: Collision Course

"I can't believe it," Adrien breathed. "I mean, I thought it was crazy finding out the three of them worked together, but _four?_ You, too? Unbelievable!"

"Insane, right?" Chloe laughed. "I was in perpetual shock my whole first year working here."

"I think I'm following in your footsteps," Adrien admitted.

He couldn't get the stupid smile to leave his face. All this time he'd been away, Chloe hadn't been scraping by without him like he'd once feared—she'd _flourished_. She sat tall before him, strong and sure. The years had been kind to her, matching Chloe's routine claims from when they'd talked.

Between work and trying to keep himself busy, staying in touch with Chloe was near impossible. They had managed, holding infrequent video chats and phone calls. When they both found the time in their schedules, the calls would last for hours. They'd talk about anything and everything in that span of time. Everything except, as it seemed, Chloe's place of work.

Adrien looked around the room. It had emptied out, the others leaving to allow them to catch up. He lowered his voice anyway.

"Why didn't you ever say anything?" Adrien asked, eyes searching. "I know you told me you were working for a fashion company, but you always dodged giving me a name. Why didn't you want me to know?" There was a slight edge of hurt in his voice.

Chloe's shoulders collapsed. "You were... I was worried you weren't ready," she explained. "You were trying to figure out how to get better at your own pace, and you never got around to contacting any of your old friends besides me, so I just thought..." Chloe trailed off, shaking her head. "I thought you weren't ready to take that step. I knew you'd want to visit DCD if I mentioned it, so I didn't out of fear that you'd be forcing yourself to dig up old memories before you could handle it." Chloe squeezed his hands. If anyone could understand the struggle of overcoming the past, it would be her. "I didn't want to jeopardize you getting better," Chloe finished sincerely.

Lurking in her eyes, however, there still remained some doubt as to if he was even prepared to handle facing the people of his past today.

"Well, I think you made the right call. The timing feels pretty damn right to me," Adrien declared, erasing all doubt.

He felt truth ring in his words. It _did_ feel right to be here. Every decision Adrien had made since committing to finding happiness had somehow brought him to this place and these people. Be it a coincidence or fate, Adrien didn't care—he had found where he belonged.

Knuckles rapping on the door interrupted, quickly followed by Nathanaël's head popping into the room.

"Last call if either of you wanted a chocolate filled doughnut." Nathanaël stood in the doorway, arm outstretched to offer the remaining two doughnuts in the pastry box. "Alya took half the box already, so you better get them before they're gone."

"Should you really be offering models doughnuts?" Chloe asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"I'm fairly sure Alya would find a way to call withholding doughnuts employee abuse," Nathanaël countered.

Chloe shrugged in agreement. "I'll pass."

"I'm gonna pass, too," Adrien seconded.

"Your loss," Nathanaël said, taking a doughnut for himself. After taking a chocolatey bite, he seemed to remember his original reason for knocking. "Oh, right, and Alya told me to get you," he nodded to Chloe, "to fill out the new paperwork with me. And you," he nodded to Adrien, "need to see Marinette for measurements and alterations. Chloe's modeled enough for us in the past that we already have her measurements and a specialized mannequin, so she's all set in that department."

"Okay, sure," Adrien said. Both he and Chloe stood to leave. "When should I see her?"

"Yesterday!" The shout squeezed its way past Nathanaël from the outside hall. Approaching clicks of shoes on tile and a verbal avalanche announced Alya as she breezed by. "We're insanely behind, and now I've got to rework to sell this whole 'couple' angle. The photoshoot is around the corner, and we need to generate even more publicity before the fashion show. I need to contact the interviewers, and I've got to pull strings and get another invite... Ugh! I'm going to be making phone calls and sending emails non-stop!"

"Easy there," Nathanaël called as Alya tore down the hallway. He held up the last untouched doughnut as a peace offering. "Would another one make you feel better?"

"This isn't a Snickers commercial, Nathanaël!" Alya cried out as she passed the man with flaming hair. Despite her words, a moment later, Alya had backtracked and snatched the pastry from his grasp. "But yes."

Adrien muffled his chuckle. "Was that more to save her sanity or ours?"

Nathanaël took another bite and pointed at the blonde. " _Yes_ ," he simply answered. With an impish grin, Nathanaël slipped out the door, Chloe falling in step behind him. "Marinette should be down a floor. Good luck, man!"

As the elevator descended, Adrien could feel his heart rise into his throat. He hoped that Nathanaël was right, that when it came to Marinette, luck would finally be on his side.

* * *

"Alya just leaves sweets lying around all the time! It's wonderful!" Tikki rejoiced as she worked her way through the chocolate filling. This treat was a particular favorite of hers. "I don't even think she's suspicious! She just thinks everyone likes them so much that they'll swipe something if she leaves it unattended for too long!"

"Uh-huh. Yeah. Definitely." Plagg was paying zero attention. Not that Tikki would know, being a bit preoccupied at the moment. His whiskers twitched in anticipation as Chloe and Adrien split ways. Instead of following his partner like he naturally would, the kwami decided to make a slight detour.

"I think I'm going to explore the vents a little more," Plagg said, drifting in the direction Chloe was traveling.

Tikki nodded. "Go ahead, I'll meet you downstairs and catch you up if you miss anything." Licking her hands clean, the spotted kwami flitted off, no questions asked.

Wasting no time, Plagg wove cleanly through the ventilation system, making sure to always keep Chloe in sight. He watched carefully, not wanting any opportunity to slip by. She was his ticket to getting Adrien back, he was sure of it. All Plagg needed was a chance to talk to Chloe when she was alone, and they'd be able to work as a team to get Adrien feeling better and wearing his ring again.

He could wait. He could be patient. Plagg would do whatever it took to get back his Chat Noir.

* * *

The gentle brush of a tape measure around Adrien's neck felt like the constriction of a python under all his nerves. Adrien kept himself from swallowing, but Marinette could sense his anxiousness nonetheless.

"You're all fidgety," Marinette commented. It was the polite way of pointing out how he would tense under her touch and his eyes would dart to and from her face indecisively. "Relax a bit. I don't bite," she promised. "Though if you don't keep still, you might become a pincushion once I start pinning."

Adrien laughed. "Sorry," he apologized, making an effort to ease his breathing and twitchy muscles. "I guess I'm just a bit... Out of sorts lately."

Marinette hummed in acknowledgement. Circling Adrien, she moved to measure the breadth of his shoulders. "I'm told it can be quite unsettling at first," she said. "Being around me, that is. The people I don't recognize right off the bat seem to feel it the most."

"People have told you that to your face?" Adrien asked in disbelief. His disbelief stemmed more from the fact that she'd immediately pinpointed what was wrong. Nothing got past this woman.

"More or less," Marinette said, remaining steady in her work. "I understand where they're coming from though—the feeling is fairly mutual. I'm different from how they remember me, and I rarely remember all that I should about them. The strangeness can be unnerving at first." She then smiled. Adrien couldn't see her face, but he could hear it in her voice. "But I've come to really like getting to know a person a second time. It's crazy to know a person was once a friend and that they want to become one all over again. You know the end result, but the getting there is still kind of a mystery." Finished, Marinette walked around to face Adrien. She sent him a wink. "Unraveling that mystery is my favorite part."

Adrien, lacking for words, watched as she strode over to take a dress shirt, suit jacket, and matching pants off a nearby rack. He felt slightly relieved as she handed him the pieces to wear. Standing under her gaze in only underwear made Adrien more convinced than ever that the woman could see straight through him. Slipping into the garments at least gave him the allusion that he was less transparent. When he had them on, Adrien didn't make any adjustments, allowing Marinette to manipulate the clothing to her liking.

"So, I'm curious," Marinette mused as she opened a container of pins. "What's so different to you? How did we act around each other before?"

Adrien considered for a moment. "I guess it's your confidence. You're a lot more outgoing and sure of yourself," he said, watching her hands gracefully work. "You were pretty shy before. That's how you were around me anyway. With me, you kind of kept quiet, but whenever I saw you with someone else, you'd be talking up a storm. When we did talk though, you were always super nice. So, we were friends. Maybe not the closest, but definitely good friends." Adrien left it at that, feeling awkward. It felt so odd telling her about herself.

"Huh." Marinette paused to look up. "Well, if it's alright with you, I'd rather keep talking to you. I happen to quite like it," she said mirthfully, flashing him a playful grin.

"See! There! That's what I'm talking about," Adrien cried out. "I don't think I ever heard you crack a joke before!"

The Marinette he once knew was never this openly free with him. In this new Marinette, however, Adrien got to see a clever, daring, vivacious side of the girl that he'd never experienced. It was a surprise, for sure, but undoubtedly a welcomed one. Adrien realized, after a moment, that these were some of the same characteristics he had loved in Ladybug. Before Adrien could entertain that thought and fall down a slippery slope, Marinette pulled him out of his head.

"Let me know when you get sick of hearing them," she said, words slightly muffled by the pins carefully positioned between her upturned lips. "Nathanaël should be able to fashion you a pair of earplugs."

Adrien chuckled. "Nah, thanks for offering. I happen to quite like it," he threw her own words back her way. Hearing her then laugh under her breath brought a smile to his face.

There was a lapse in conversation, and they let a companionable silence settle. Adrien, finally relaxed, took the time to look around the room. It was spacious, but filled to the brim with Marinette's accomplishments. The number of clothing racks was staggering; the thought that it had all been accomplished by the single woman before him in a handful of years was even more impressive.

"You were always so motivated," Adrien said, breaking the lull. "Seeing DCD and all its success in such a short period of time... I feel only someone like you could pull this off. Any other person might let an accident like yours hold them back, but not you." Adrien snorted. "If anything, it probably only made you _more_ driven."

"Like I'd let a near death experience or amnesia hold me back," the designer scoffed. Marinette's fingers pulled, placed, and pinned without her supervision, their natural instinct at work. Finishing a particularly troublesome spot, she then paused, thumbing over the fabric. "Losing a chunk of my life just made me want to live the rest of it to the fullest. Work harder, love more, worry less—that kind of thing."

In a sudden gust of motion, Marinette was again in front of Adrien, her face shining with a triumphant grin. "So, what do you say we kick some ass and turn the fashion world upside down?"

A fierce fire burned in Marinette's eyes, and Adrien felt himself frozen in her gaze. A similar fire had once burned in his, though it had long since been extinguished. But in that look, Adrien felt as though her passion was contagious, that if he stood under that gaze long enough, he would reignite.

Again, he felt like all his decisions had been leading him to this moment. Adrien was drawn to her. In what way, he wasn't quite sure yet. For all he knew, they could be destined on a collision course. How right it all felt made Adrien not question a thing.

If them colliding was what it took to feel the fire in Marinette's eyes, then it would be well worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short setup chapter. Thought a checkup on Tikki and Plagg was overdue, too. Our crew is geared up and ready to get down to work. Another character gets introduced next chapter... Guess who?
> 
> Edit: I made changes to a section of this chapter. It was rushed, and I wasn't happy with it. Apologies.


End file.
